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Today's News Recap
Kraken Props - Kraken acquires prop trading platform Breakout, co-founded by ‘Crypto Twitter’ mainstays Mayne and Cred.
Korean Caps - South Korea caps crypto lending at 20% interest, bans leveraged loans.
Looking Ahead - Bitcoin faces jobs test as Tether considers gold mining.
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In Messari News
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Top Assets
Messari Protocol Reporting
Messari's protocol reports give you a deep dive on the foundation and state of top crypto protocols, including key metrics and notable events. See the complete list of protocol reports here and get a preview of our latest report below.
Layer-3 blockchain built on Arbitrum Orbit, purpose-built for education apps, finance, and credentials
Token price rose 15.8% QoQ to $0.13, with a market cap increase to $34.7M
$10M grant to Pencil Finance to launch onchain student lending
Validator Program grew to 35+ university blockchain clubs globally
Cross-chain DEX & bridge aggregator that finds and executes the best route to move assets between chains
Usage up: ~1.1M tx (+24% QoQ); ~7.6K daily active addresses (+7%)
Launched Rango Learning Center; targeted incentives to onboard and activate users
Decentralized storage marketplace built on IPFS.
Network utilization hit 32% in Q2 2025 as storage demand held up while overall capacity declined from provider churn
Daily new storage deals rose 25% QoQ (3.5 PiB/day), signaling sustained demand for enterprise and research workloads.
Focus is moving from raw capacity toward high-value datasets (864 >1,000 TiB in size, +7.5% QoQ)
From Our Sponsor
Chainlink and the United States Department of Commerce have worked together to bring U.S. government macroeconomic data onchain.
These new Chainlink Data Feeds securely deliver critical information around key U.S. economy metrics onchain, sourced from the Bureau of Economic Analysis, such as Real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and the Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) Price Index.
This development builds upon Chainlink’s accelerated work with the U.S. government in 2025, including meeting with several key officials and regulators to make policy recommendations that are advancing the growth of the blockchain industry.
Fundraising Friday
Fewer Deals, Bigger Checks: Inside 2025’s M&A Surge
By: Jake Koch-Gallup, Research Analyst
If you only looked at fundraises, you’d think 2025 has been a slow year for crypto venture. But look at M&A, and the picture flips.
So far this year, crypto companies have announced $9.8 billion across 29 disclosed M&As. From 2020 through 2024 combined, the industry saw $12.0 billion across 94 disclosed deals. 2025 alone is close to matching the past five years combined and more than triple the size of any single year from 2020 through 2023.
Major 2025 Deals
This year’s largest acquisitions include:
Kraken paid $1.5 billion for NinjaTrader, a regulated U.S. futures brokerage, the largest-ever crypto-to-TradFi crossover.
Ripple acquired Hidden Road for $1.25 billion, creating crypto’s first multi-asset prime broker.
Each of these would have been industry-defining in past cycles. In 2025, they’re happening one after another.
Below that top tier, consolidation is broadening: MoonPay acquired Helio and Iron ($275M combined), Chainalysis acquired Alterya ($150M), Talos bought Coin Metrics ($100M), and LayerZero regained Stargate ($120M). From payments to compliance to cross-chain liquidity, mid-tier infrastructure is being folded into larger players.
Historical Comparison
Looking back shows just how unusual this cycle is.
2022-2023: The bear market brought distressed sales and bargain buys, but little in the way of strategic blockbusters.
2024: Activity picked up, but deal values still trailed venture rounds by a wide margin.
In short, past years were marked by smaller or distressed deals. 2025 is defined by fewer but far larger acquisitions, a clear pivot to consolidation.
Why Now?
Three shifts explain why 2025 looks so different:
Regulatory clarity. After years of uncertainty, governments are laying down rules. The U.S. has softened its enforcement streak, Europe has MiCA, and Asia is pushing digital asset frameworks. That makes billion-dollar acquisitions feasible.
Capital efficiency. Investors are less interested in scattering seed checks across 100 projects. Consolidation channels capital into businesses with proven users, licenses, and revenue.
Strategic positioning. Kraken secures futures, Coinbase dominates options, Ripple locks in prime brokerage, and Stripe embeds stablecoins. Building takes years. Buying takes a signature.
What It Means
For startups, exits are finally real. Instead of relying solely on token launches, founders can now sell to incumbents like Coinbase, Stripe, or MoonPay, recycling capital back into the ecosystem.
For investors, M&A provides liquidity that venture funding can’t. Big exits return capital to LPs, validate valuations, and create room for new funds to deploy.
For the industry, it marks a shift from fragmentation to consolidation. Core crypto rails are increasingly controlled by a handful of large incumbents, similar to the path taken by traditional tech and finance.
The Takeaway
Crypto has spent the last decade defined by fundraising. 2025 is defined by acquisitions.
Some will call that boring, a sign that crypto is maturing into a corporate industry. But history says otherwise. Consolidation doesn’t kill innovation; it funds it. Every exit recycles capital back into the system, fueling the next wave of startups.
M&A isn’t the end of innovation. It’s fuel for the next cycle.
Messari Research
For a Crypto Game: Spellborne Review
By: Gunkan, Research Analyst
Spellborne is a retro-inspired Monster-catching RPG built on Avalanche and Abstract, blending familiar pixel art aesthetics with modern crypto integration. The game’s strengths lie in its Monster customization and PvP systems, which provide meaningful player choice and a foundation for competitive play. However, many features such as farming, crafting, and questing feel shallow, while the Treasures of Celestia gacha mechanic and inconsistent difficulty scaling limit long-term engagement. Technical performance, particularly on mobile, remains the biggest barrier, leaving Spellborne a promising but unfinished project that has yet to realize its full potential.
