NFT Lending Platform Arcade Raises $15 Million in Series A

Arcade, a decentralized finance (DeFi) marketplace and NFT lending platform, has raised a total of $15 million in its Series A investment round with an aim to lead the financialization of high-value non-fungible tokens (NFTs).

Leading global investors, including Pantera Capital, Castle Island Ventures, Franklin Templeton Blockchain Fund and Golden Tree Asset Management joined the $15 million funding round of Arcade. The CEO of BlockFi, Zac Prince and the CEO of Quantstamp, Richard Ma also participated in the latest financing.

In addition to Arcade, several other names in the DeFi market raised millions of dollars in funding this year to expand their operations. Earlier this year, decentralized exchange dYdX raised $10 million in a Series B funding round led by Three Arrows Capital and DeFiance Capital.

Arcade facilitated the largest and first, permissionless, on-chain loan of $800,000 against an NFT portfolio from a $10B+ lender in its private release. Moreover, the overall value of assets that have been loaned on the platform touched $10 million.

“The DeFi industry currently contains over $200B in Total Locked Value, with NFTs accounting for a significant portion of that value; however, the lack of infrastructure in DeFi prevents NFT holders from achieving liquidity on their holdings despite massive market caps," explained Gabe Frank, the Co-Founder of Arcade.

DeFi Funding

During the first week of December 2021, DeFi startup Earnity secured $15 million in funding for the expansion of its operations. Arcade highlighted that the recent funding will facilitate the company’s vision to support the broader utilization of DeFi and NFTs.

“Arcade brings expansive utility to the DeFi lending space and is fully compatible with all ERC20 tokens, including wETH, USDC, and DAI. Arcade also features proprietary Wrapped NFT (wNFT) technology which allows multiple NFT assets to be bundled and utilized to acquire a single loan, enabling the acquisition of larger loans and greater liquidity. As an open-source DeFi primitive, Arcade will also enable developers to build on top of the platform, supporting the broader utilization of this new asset class,” the company added.