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The digital asset-focused investment firm Arca received $10 million in Series A funding.

The round was led by RRE Ventures and included participants such as Loews Hotels & Co. president Alex Tisch. James Robinson, RRE’s founder, has joined Arca’s advisory board as part of the deal.

“We seek to create bespoke opportunities for investors, and the digital asset revolution may be one of the best examples of that in the current and future market environment,” said Michael Margolies, CEO of Littlebanc Advisors, in a statement published today. “We believe Arca’s experienced team will continue helping sophisticated investors enter and navigate this new financial landscape with confidence.”

The funding comes months after Arca officially registered a U.S. Treasury-focused fund — one involving a token for stakeholders — with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission after a two-year process, as previously reported by The Block. Shares for Arca U.S. Treasury Fund are issued in the form of so-called ArCoins.

© 2021 The Block Crypto, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.

Pantera Capital ended 2020 on a high note. 

Dan Morehead’s investment firm clocked in triple digit percentage gains across its three digital asset funds, according to an investment note shared with The Block. The firm’s ICO fund, which previously was up more than 300% earlier in the year, ended 2020 up more than 500%, according to the note. Its bitcoin fund, meanwhile, ended 2020 up 299%. 

To be sure, the fund’s performance wasn’t that much better than bitcoin, which ended the year up 330%.  

In the note, Morehead said the the ongoing rally in the digital asset market is less about hype than the previous rally in 2017, adding that focus has shifted from alt-coins and initial coin offerings to bitcoin and ethereum. 

“There has been a massive shift from highly speculative, mainly non-functioning tokens having roughly half of the total market cap in 2017 – to today when the market cap is mainly in the two proven, functioning chains: bitcoin and ethereum,” Morehead wrote. “Those two chains have 86% of the value. The other 5,000 chains have 14%.”

Pantera was an active investor amidst the ICO mania, investing in projects like Filecoin and 0x. 

Unsurprisingly, the firm is bullish on bitcoin, highlighting its price target of $115,000 by 2021. Morehead said that the impact of bitcoin’s halving last year has yet to fully play out, adding that the impact on supply is still not priced in. 

Disclosure: Pantera participated in an earlier The Block fundraising round.

© 2021 The Block Crypto, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.

Crypto security firm Fireblocks has added staking capabilities to its platform, with initial support for Ethereum 2.0 (Eth2), Polkadot (DOT), and Tezos (XTZ) coins.

The firm has partnered with staking infrastructure providers Staked and Blockdaemon for the new offering. Fireblocks said its more than 165 institutional customers would now be able to earn 5% to 15% staking rewards.

Staking is a way of increasing holdings of proof-of-stake coins by becoming a validator on a blockchain network. It can be seen similar to the mining of proof-of-work coins such as bitcoin.

Setting up staking infrastructure is “complicated” and requires two to three full-time employees to integrate and manage blockchain validator nodes, said Fireblocks, adding that its service will help clients leverage its security technology along with other services such as trading and lending.

Given “significant” customer demand, Fireblocks said it would add staking support for more coins later this year.

© 2021 The Block Crypto, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.