Report shows crypto-currency startups raised $30.3 billion in the first half of 2022, surpassing the total raised in 2021

While the crypto-currency markets have performed poorly in the first two quarters of 2022, a recently released fundraising report by Messari researchers shows that $30.3 billion was raised by crypto-currency projects and startups in the first half of 2022.

The $30.3 billion raised across 1,199 funding rounds exceeds all the funding that blockchain startups and projects raised last year.

The crypto-currency ecosystem’s first-half funding report shows that capital is still flowing in despite the crypto-currency winter.

A significant amount of money has flowed into blockchain projects and specific startups within the crypto industry, according to the “H1 2022 Fundraising Report” published by Messari and Dove Metrics. According to the report, centralized finance (cefi) outpaced decentralized finance (defi), with cefi capturing more than $10.2 billion in H1.

Defi managed to raise $1.8 billion, while Web3 and non-fungible token (NFT) projects and related companies raised $8.6 billion in the first six months of the year. 9.7 billion has flowed into the blockchain and crypto infrastructure sector, and while Web3 and NFT saw the third most capital raised, the Web3-NFT sector saw the most fundraising with 530 rounds in the first two quarters.

June was the biggest month for Defi, as a number of Defi projects and companies raised $624 million. “Despite DeFi’s maturity, seed rounds continue to dominate“, Messari researchers explain in the report. The highest number of funds raised in a month for infrastructure was February, for cefi the best month was January, and the best month for the Web3-NFT sector was April.

Ethereum-based defi projects and startups received the most funding rounds and highest dollar amounts compared to alternative smart contract blockchains like Solana, Avalanche and Polkadot when it comes to fundraising. Ethereum-based defi projects saw 54 transactions in Q1 and 61 transactions in Q2. In Q1, Ethereum-based defi projects raised $387 million, while projects from alternative blockchains raised $309 million in Q1 2022.

In the second quarter, ETH-based defi raised $890 million, while projects based on alternative blockchains raised about $193 million. Messari researchers note that in the Web3-NFT sector, startup funding is the most numerous and gaming dwarfs most NFT funding. Once again, Ethereum also dominated in the Web3-NFT sector, compared to alternative smart contract platform networks.

Cefi, infrastructure, mature Web3 sectors

With respect to centralized finance, cefi “continues to mature“, says Messari’s report, which points out that funding rounds of $10 million or more “represent 50% of the activity.“Messari’s latest first-half fundraising report follows the recent release of the “4th Annual Global Crypto Hedge Fund Report 2022“, written by the international professional services firm Pricewaterhousecoopers (PWC).

Information from PWC’s crypto-currency study shows that hedge funds injecting capital into crypto-currency and blockchain projects has increased since last year. PWC researchers estimated that 21 percent of hedge funds participated in crypto-related funding rounds, while this year’s participation rate has increased to 38 percent.

Messari’s fundraising report shows that many sectors are “mature“as Series A or later rounds accounted for more than 40% of funding rounds devoted to crypto-currency infrastructure in H1. Web3’s Series A or later rounds accounted for about 30%+ of funding rounds in H1 2022. Investors mentioned in Messari’s fundraising report include companies such as FTX, Mechanism Capital, Pantera Capital, Sequoia Capital, Gumi Cryptos, Dragonfly Capital, Slow Ventures, Seven Seven Six, and a dozen and a half others.