Tracking of Key Project Progress (Issue 2 · Week 29, 2026)

01Summary of Financing Events This Week

A total of 6 financing deals have been recorded in this period (after deduplication).

As of 2026-07-15, 6 financing deals have been recorded in total (after deduplication), with a combined funding amount of $1.699 billion and an average funding amount per deal of $283 million.

This week, financing activity was concentrated in the two sectors of RWA/Compliance and AI and Infrastructure. Ionic Digital and Securitize each raised $400 million on 07-15, while Digital Asset received $355 million in investment on 07-11, indicating strong institutional interest in compliance-related solutions and infrastructure for asset tokenization. In the AI sector, Prime Intellect and Gauntlet secured $130 million and $125 million in funding respectively, reflecting market attention toward AI agents and underlying computing infrastructure. The DeFi/Trading sector was led by Bitbank’s $289 million merger and acquisition deal, highlighting the trend of integration between traditional finance and crypto trading services. Overall, large-scale funding tends to flow into infrastructure projects with regulatory advantages or technological moats, showing a clear concentration of market capital among leading players.

02Analysis of Key Projects

On July 15, 2026, primary market financing this week showed clear signs of institutionalization and compliance-driven trends. Ionic Digital and Securitize each raised $400 million, totaling $800 million—accounting for half of the total financing amount for the week. These two large-scale fundraisings not only set new records for single deals recently but also signaled the deep involvement of traditional financial capital in the RWA (Real World Assets) sector.

As providers of digital asset custody and infrastructure, Ionic Digital’s $400 million private placement reflected a surge in institutions’ demand for secure custody services. Amidst increasingly strict regulations, compliant custody has become a key requirement for institutional funds to enter this market. Meanwhile, Securitize also secured $400 million in funding, further solidifying its leadership in the field of securities tokenization. On July 14, 2026, the U.S. and UK finance ministries jointly released a roadmap with 10 regulatory measures aimed at aligning SEC and FCA rules and removing cross-border regulatory barriers. This favorable policy environment directly drove a reevaluation of the value of compliant RWA infrastructure, providing strong macro-policy support for the financing deals of Ionic Digital and Securitize.

Bitbank completed a merger and acquisition deal worth $289 million, highlighting the accelerating trend of traditional financial institutions expanding into the crypto space. This deal was not merely about injecting capital; it involved integrating existing technologies and user bases through M&A, reflecting the competition among mature financial systems to gain access to the crypto industry. Prime Intellect’s $130 million Series A financing demonstrated the ongoing enthusiasm for the convergence of AI and blockchain. Although Binance’s plan to launch its AI trading mainnet on July 8, 2026, is not expected until 2027, resulting in cautious market reactions, Prime Intellect’s funding shows that projects focused on AI agents and data infrastructure still enjoy capital favor.

In terms of valuation rationale, Ionic Digital and Securitize’s $400 million in funding reflects the premium associated with their status as compliant infrastructure providers. With the U.S. and UK working together to establish legal claims and reserve isolation mechanisms for stablecoins, platforms with compliant licenses and technical capabilities have greater pricing power. Bitbank’s $289 million acquisition valuation reflects traditional finance’s willingness to pay a premium for access to crypto-related traffic. Overall, the financing data from this week indicates that capital is shifting from early-stage speculative projects to leading projects with compliance advantages and infrastructure capabilities. RWA and AI infrastructure have become the core areas for capital allocation.

03Trends in Investment Firms

Benchmark date: 2026-07-15

This week, the total financing in the primary market reached $195 million across 61 transactions, with capital heavily concentrated in the RWA/compliance, AI, and infrastructure sectors. Although leading projects such as Ionic Digital and Securitize have already secured substantial funding, institutional interest in narratives centered on compliance and AI integration has not diminished; rather, it has driven further capital flow toward infrastructure and enterprise-level solutions.

On 07-14, the U.S. and UK finance ministries jointly released a 10-point regulatory roadmap aimed at aligning SEC and FCA rules and removing cross-border regulatory barriers. This policy signal significantly enhanced the financing certainty for compliance-related projects, encouraging traditional capital to enter the market faster. As a result, the market has shown characteristics of strong valuations for high-quality projects alongside increasing differentiation. In the AI sector, despite Binance launching its Layer 1 plan focused on AI trading on 07-08, market reactions have been cautious, indicating that institutions are hesitant about purely conceptual AI projects and prefer infrastructure with practical application scenarios.

Regarding co-investment relationships, leading projects in the RWA and AI fields tend to attract multiple rounds of joint investment from institutions, forming tight networks of collaboration. With the regulatory framework further clarifying the priority of stablecoin holders in repayment on 07-15, compliant infrastructure has become a hot spot for co-investment. Institutions are reducing policy risks through coordinated investments to strengthen their presence in digital financial innovation.

04Distribution of funds in the industry

A total of 61 financing deals were recorded in this period, with a combined amount of $1.95 billion. The distribution of funds shows a high degree of concentration among leading projects, with three core sectors emerging as key areas of interest: RWA/compliance, AI and infrastructure, and DeFi/trading.

In terms of funding trends, the integration of compliance with AI has become the top priority for institutional capital. Ionic Digital and Securitize each raised $400 million, Digital Asset raised $355 million, Bitbank raised $289 million, Prime Intellect raised $130 million, and Gauntlet raised $125 million. These leading projects alone account for a significant portion of the funding, indicating that large amounts of capital are flowing toward institutional-level solutions that possess compliance credentials or AI infrastructure capabilities.

Compared to the previous period (56 financing deals totaling $1.83 billion), there was an increase of 5 deals this time, with the total amount rising by $120 million. Although the overall volume remained relatively stable, there was a clear shift in funding preferences: traditional capital and tech giants are accelerating their entry into these fields, driving RWA and AI initiatives to dominate the primary market. While DeFi and infrastructure projects received solid support, their level of attention lagged behind the explosive growth in compliance and AI sectors.

The trend toward institutionalization is further intensifying, with both native crypto VCs and traditional capital participating, though the latter’s role in compliance and infrastructure areas has grown significantly. It is expected that future funding will continue to concentrate on infrastructure and institutional-level solutions, leading to greater divergence in market valuations and enhanced resilience for high-quality projects.

05Operation Recommendations and Risk Warnings

Operational Recommendations

• Regulatory Policy Arbitrage Window (Next 2 Weeks) The U.S. and UK finance ministries released a regulatory roadmap containing 10 key points on 07-14, emphasizing the priority repayment rights for stablecoin holders. Given the sharp surge in the market sentiment index to 36.0 points on 07-15 (from 14.2 to 50.1), coupled with a 60-point increase in Whale activity, it is recommended to adopt a phased investment strategy for compliance-sensitive assets such as tokens issued by stablecoin issuers. If official working groups provide further details on the timeline for implementing cross-border financing rules in subsequent statements after 07-15, investors can consider increasing holdings slightly to capture potential valuation recovery as policies become clearer.

• Technology Upgrade-Driven Events (This Week) Core developers of Zcash (ZEC) have confirmed that the Ironwood upgrade is expected to activate on 07-28. The current price of ZEC is $552.07, with a 7-day gain of +13.2%. Considering that there is usually speculation in the market before an upgrade, it is advised to take a moderately defensive approach. If the ZEC price falls below $540.00 within the next 3 trading days and trading volume shrinks below $400M, it may indicate that the market has already priced in the positive news or that funds are withdrawing. In such cases, investors should consider reducing holdings to lock in profits and avoid the risk of “buying expectations and selling reality” after the upgrade is implemented.

• Network Stability Risk Hedging (This Week) Builders of the TON ecosystem reported delays in mainnet shard block generation and message processing on 07-13, with the core team already working to resolve these issues. The current price of TON is $1.78, with a 7-day gain of +3.8%. It is recommended to maintain a cautious stance regarding TON-related positions and pause any new investments. If no clear fix announcement is released by officials by 07-16 or network latency does not return to normal levels, investors should gradually reduce holdings to avoid potential liquidity shocks caused by a loss of technical trust.

Risk Warnings

• Risk of Extreme Sentiment Reversal The market sentiment index experienced severe fluctuations on 07-15, dropping sharply from 51.8 to 36.2 (Fear) before rising back to 50.1 (Neutral). If the sentiment index falls below 40 again, accompanied by a narrowing consensus gap between bullish and bearish views among key influencers to within +20 percentage points, investors should be vigilant against potential chain reactions of sell-offs due to a breakdown in short-term market consensus. It is advisable to tighten stop-loss levels.

• Risk of Regulatory Implementation Falling Short of Expectations Although the joint U.S.-UK roadmap was released on 07-14, it aims to coordinate rules among agencies such as the SEC and FCA, and actual implementation will require testing by industry working groups. If progress on the testing projects is slow or regulatory disagreements arise, it could lead to a decline in compliance-related optimism, affecting the valuation logic of related sectors. Investors need to closely monitor updates from official working groups.

• Risk of Spreading Technical Failures In addition to TON, NEAR completed its v2.13.0 upgrade on 07-10, introducing post-quantum signatures, while ZEC is also set for an upgrade on 07-28. If multiple blockchain platforms experience similar issues such as delayed block generation or node synchronization problems during the same period as TON, it could trigger widespread concerns about the stability of Layer 1 infrastructure. This might lead to capital flowing into safer assets, so it is important to monitor any abnormal fluctuations in block confirmation times across various chains.

06Related Reads

1. “US and UK Jointly Release 10 Roadmaps to Redefine Regulation of Tokenization and Stablecoins”
2. “Binance Launches AI-Driven Trading Chain: Mainnet Coming in 2027, but Market Remains Indifferent”
3. “Mainnet Launch Sparks 150 Million Cat Coins; RWA Vision Faces Meme Boom”
4. “US-UK Working Group Releases Stablecoin Roadmap Emphasizing Holder Priority in Repayment”
5. “US and UK Publish Digital Assets Roadmap to Drive Stablecoin Innovation”
6. “Zcash Ironwood Upgrade Expected to Activate Mainnet on July 28”
7. “DELAY IN TON Mainnet Sharding Block Production”
8. “NEAR Mainnet Upgraded to Version 2.13.0, with Post-Quantum Signatures and Other Features Launched”