Sovereign wealth fund GIC leads $170 million fundraiser for Chainalysis
Cryptocurrency crimefighter Chainalysis has reportedly raised $170 million in a Series F funding round that values it at $8.6 billion, The Information reports on Wednesday.
The decent valuation comes less than two years after the NYC-based company first attained the ‘unicorn’ title back in November 2020. Chainalysis’ latest financing follows its $200 million Series E and D rounds in 2021, bringing the total amount it raised so far to $536 million.
Behind the latest cash injection was Singapore-based sovereign wealth fund GIC. Chainalysis has initially nabbed a $30 million investment in February 2019, led by venture firm Accel, a growth-stage venture capital firm, then raised a further $20 million from two major Japanese investors.
The new round gives Chainalysis fuel to aggressively deliver on its crypto investigation and compliance services. The company intends to use the fresh capital to hire for hundreds of new positions across all functions to continue its global expansion, as well as to deepen data advantage by covering more cryptocurrencies and focusing on emerging use cases like DeFi and NFTs.
Chainalysis solved high-profile criminal cases
The startup, which has offices in New York, Washington DC, Copenhagen, Singapore and Tokyo provides financial institutions, cryptocurrency exchanges and law enforcement with a platform to detect and investigate cryptocurrency money laundering, fraud and compliance violations.
Additionally, Chainalysis is selling its bitcoin-tracing technology and compliance software to banks and brokers to monitor and link digital identities to cryptocurrencies. Its team of data scientists and programmers are leveraging a wide range of quantitative data sources, including exchanges and blockchain data sources, to clarify and present the view of the cryptocurrency and blockchain ecosystem.
US authorities disclosed earlier that they leveraged Chainalysis investigative assistance to seize more than $1 billion worth of bitcoin associated with Silk Road, the shady dark web marketplace that it took offline in 2013.
The Department of Justice (DOJ) said it was assisted in seizing the Bitcoins by Chainalysis to identify and investigate the cryptocurrency wallets used in that case. The department estimates that Silk Road generated around 600,000 Bitcoins in commissions for facilitating narcotics sales of illegal drugs, weapons and other nefarious goods.
