Arjun Sethi’s crypto derivatives protocol Nibiru raises maiden funding at $100M valuation • TechCrunch

Nibiru, a new crypto derivatives protocol co-founded by Tribe Capital GP Arjun Sethi, has raised $7.5 million seed funding at a valuation of $100 million, two sources familiar with the matter told TechCrunch.

Tribe Capital, Republic Crypto and Kraken invested in the seed round, a source said, requesting anonymity as the information is not public.

Sethi co-founded the startups with four industry veterans – including Sankha Banerjee, formerly with Credence Capital and Binance; and Boris Revsin, who co-founded Republic Capital. Nibiru has attracted nearly two dozen contributors from firms including Meta, Reddit, JP Morgan and Yahoo, an investor deck obtained by TechCrunch showed.

The crypto market is flooded with centralized (Binance, FTX) and decentralized ETH-based perpetuals and options trading platforms (Dydx, Opyn, Perpetual Protocol). Nibiru is attempting to build the first mainstream decentralized multichain solution, according to its website.

Currently in private testnet, Nibiru’s decentralized protocol unifies derivatives trading, spot trading, staking, and bonded liquidity and aims to serve users across over 40 blockchains, it says on the website.

On its investor deck, Nibiru says it will provide customers with unlocked hedging opportunities, extremely low gas costs, MEV resistance, and high futures volume. It is also creating composable yield in rising/falling regimes using decentralized perps and options, the deck added.

A slide from Nibiru’s investor presentation where the startup describes the current state of crypto derivatives and options market

The startup plans to launch NIBIRU on public testnet later this year and mainnet by Q1 2023, the investor deck said. Sethi declined to comment Friday.