Crypto market surveillance firm Solidus Labs raises $15 million

Solidus Labs, a New York-based firm seeking to reduce risk in crypto-native markets, announced Friday that it raised $15 million in strategic funding. 

The investment firm Liberty City Ventures led the strategic funding, which drew additional participation from the early stage-focused venture firms GSR and Exor Seeds. 

With $20 million in Series A funding secured in May, Solidus' total funding is now $40 million.

Chen Arad, COO of Solidus, told The Block that the startup will use the funds to bolster crypto-native market risk monitoring tools — particularly with decentralized finance (DeFi) and non-fungible token (NFT) financial compliance — as well as to continue growing their team, which currently has 50 people. 

Solidus’ funding coincides with a broader trend of investments into crypto surveillance firms this year.

Blockchain analytics firm Elliptic raised $60 million in funding in October, and its rival Chainalysis not only raised $100 million in June — reaching a $4.2 billion valuation — but joined Dapper Labs to monitor the firm’s NFT transaction. In addition, the blockchain surveillance company TRM Labs raised $14 million in June of this year.

Correction: The article has been updated to reflect that the $40 million figure refers to Solidus' total funding, not its valuation.