Saturn is proud to announce our $2M seed round led by @TheSpartanGroup, with participation from @Anchorage, Susquehanna Crypto, and more. Saturn is building the application layer on Bitcoin - powered by $STRC. A thread on why it matters.

Crypto’s infrastructure stack is getting harder to ignore. RWAs are moving deeper into DeFi, stablecoins are reshaping payments, AI is attracting infrastructure capital, and prediction markets are becoming more modular. Here are some of the most insightful articles from the week. — @_thespacebyte compares @avax’s RWA market with its DeFi economy, highlighting the gap between asset issuance and actual onchain utility. Avalanche has $900M in RWA market cap vs $472M in DeFi TVL, but tokenized assets aren’t automatically composable DeFi capital. Whitelists, transfer restrictions and limited liquidity can constrain their use. Its next growth phase depends on turning issued assets into liquid, collateralizable and composable capital. — @​sytaylor argues stablecoins have pushed banks to modernize payments through tokenized deposits and shared blockchain infrastructure. DBS, Citi and Swift pulled off near-instant cross-border dollar transfers on a Saturday, showing how tokenized deposits can enable 24/7 payments. The competition is shifting from replacing banks to making bank money faster and programmable, while stablecoins retain an edge in open-loop payments. — @jonah_b compares crypto’s past cycles to the current AI boom, saying investors risk repeating the same mistakes. Crypto’s alt-L1 boom showed how capital can flood into infrastructure after a few breakout winners, only for blockspace to become commoditized and value to shift to apps like @HyperliquidX, @aave and @Polymarket. AI could follow the same path, with margins concentrating around apps and compute rather than models. — @0xsubwizard argues @ethena’s next growth phase depends on expanding USDe’s yield sources and distribution ahead of its fee switch. USDe currently sits at $4.75B, below the $7.5B threshold that activates the switch. Upside hinges on equity perps, recovering funding rates, and new distribution via TRON, CEX collateral and @EthenaPay. Key risks include the October unlock, negative funding, weak equity-perp adoption, credit losses and USDe failing to reach the $7.5B mark. — @PaulKlayVC explains why crypto’s token-based venture model is breaking down, as most recent TGEs have failed to create sustainable value. The major issues are weak token economics, limited transparency and a launch process driven by hype, liquidity and distribution rather than fundamentals. As the market matures, VCs are tilting toward real users, real revenue and stronger due diligence, making the gap between real products and speculation harder to ignore. — @obchakevich_ compares local stablecoins by deployments, supply and volume, showing that each metric points to a different chain. Ethereum holds 48% of stablecoin supply despite just 25% of deployments, but none of the top 10 tokens by cumulative transaction volume are chain-agnostic. Basically, deployments show where issuers go, supply shows where capital sits, and volume shows where stablecoins actually move. — @yaroslavwr_ highlights how token-level accounting errors can create bad debt in lending markets using tokenized stocks. @edeldotfinance lost ~$403K after a wrapped GOOGLx was mispriced at nearly 78x its underlying stock, despite the stock price and @chainlink oracle being correct. As tokenized equities enter DeFi, protocols must correctly handle wrapping, dividends, stock splits and conversion rates, not just the underlying asset’s price. — @steinRWA highlights the trade-off between making tokenized stocks legally native and making them composable onchain. Issuer-backed models offer stronger ties to the underlying asset but often need allowlists and transfer restrictions. Wrapper models are more transferable, enabling trading, lending and other DeFi use cases. The next hurdle is combining compliant ownership with the composability users expect from onchain assets. — @PinkBrains_io breaks down Robinhood Chain’s shift from memecoins and tokenized-stocks toward a broader RWA DeFi ecosystem. As of September, it held ~$903M in DeFi TVL, $1B in stablecoins and $260M in RWA market cap. @Uniswap, @Morpho, @Lighter_xyz, @longbowlend, and others are building trading, lending, leverage and yield products around Stock Tokens, making the chain look more like an onchain capital market. — @Baheet_ compares HIP-4 with @Polymarket, arguing the real difference is infrastructure, not volume. HIP-4’s edge is native integration with @HyperliquidX’s perps, alongside permissionless markets and deterministic settlement. The bet is that this architecture can unlock deeper liquidity and capital efficiency as HIP-4 scales. 186906679 — That’s it for the week. Stick around for more alpha article compilations weekly.

Projects Fundraising on RootData (Jun 29 - July 5) Last week, 8 blockchain companies/projects received funding. 💎 @AskVenice — Private, Permissionless AI, raised $65M in Series A by @dragonfly_xyz, @cbventures, @NorthIslandVC & others. 💎 @extendedapp — Perp Dex, raised $12.5M in strategic round by @eToro, @jump_ and Alber Blanc. 💎 @Thea_AI — AI-driven solutions for risk markets, raised $8M in strategic round by @Maven11Capital, @TheSpartanGroup, @ManifoldTrading & others. 💎 @techdollarhq — The credit layer of private markets, raised $3M in pre-seed round by @nolimithodl, @reforge_vc, @newmichwill & others.

Projects Fundraising on RootData (May 3 - May 10) Last week, 13 blockchain companies/projects received funding. 💎 @reapglobal — Web3 payment infrastructure, was acquired by @krakenfx in $600M. 💎 @HoudiniSwap — Privacy cross-chain protocol, was acquired by @solstrategies in $18M. 💎 @opentrade_io — DeFi for the real world, raised $17M in strategic round by @mercuryfund, NotionCapital, @a16zcrypto & others. 💎 @onrefinance — On-chain reinsurance company, raised $5M in Series A by @FWDind & @Rockaway_X. 💎 @saturn_credit — Stablecoin yield protocol, raised $2M in seed round by @TheSpartanGroup, @Anchorage, Susquehanna Crypto & others.

In August 2021, IVC (Infinity Ventures Crypto) @ivcryptofund was officially established. Shortly thereafter, Daniel Wang, co-founder of Aethir, joined IVC. In November 2021, IVC partnered with YGG to launch YGG SEA, which is now known as W3GG (@w3ggofficial). Around the same time, the two parties also co-founded YGG Japan (@YGGJapan). In February 2022, IVC closed a $70 million Web3 fund, backed by investors including @Circle, @DCGco , @AnimocaBrands, Hive Ventures, and Cherubic Ventures. IVC later deployed the first investment from this fund by co-investing in @YGG alongside @a16z. IVC’s partners include: 1. Akio Tanaka @tanakaakio  Founder of @HeadlineVC Headline Asia and co-founder of IVC. 
 Tanaka, who is Japanese, is widely regarded as an OG within Japan’s traditional venture capital circle, having built Headline Asia into one of the region’s established VC platforms. 2. Brian Lu  @LuBall13 Former co-founder and GP of IVC. 
 Brian Lu also comes from a notable entrepreneurial family. His father, Hong Liang Lu, is the founder of UTStarcom and a founding figure behind SoftBank China Venture Capital (SBCVC). 3. JT Law  @JorLaw8  Co-founder of VerifyInvestor. 4. Gabby Dizon @gabusch Co-founder of YGG (Yield Guild Games). 5. Alex Yeh @alex_yehya Co-founder of AuraBlock Ventures, and also a co-founder of $GAIB @gaib_ai Richie Chaval Jiaravanon @RichieLychee Former CEO of Snapask Thailand.
 He also holds another role as a board member at Velo Labs @veloprotocol Behind the Jiaravanon family stands the Charoen Pokphand Group, Thailand’s largest private conglomerate, widely known as the CP Group.  Returning to Daniel Wang, who was seconded by IVC to Aethir as a representative and co-founder of the project. According to publicly available information, between August 2021 and August 2023, Daniel Wang held roles across IVC, W3GG, and Aethir simultaneously. We’ve also just received information from sources familiar with the matter claiming that, during his time at IVC, Daniel Wang allegedly accepted various kickbacks tied to deals, which reportedly caused dissatisfaction among several of IVC’s core partners. A quick side note here: IVC is widely regarded as the most active investor among Japan-based crypto funds in terms of the number of crypto projects backed. @FSA_Japan @cyberpolice_jp @JVCEA_Official @jcba_official @CoinDesk @coin_post @circle  @DCGco @animocabrands  @TheSpartanGroup   @Morningstar_VC @shimacapital   @BigBrainVC  @Sfermion_   @Ventures_HTX

Back in the day, Wilson Wei (Jiequan) & Ryan Li （Yihe） and other guys  allegedly paid $400,000 in kickbacks to Wang Bingyu, a close lieutenant of Justin Sun, in order to accelerate BTT’s acquisition of Lino Network and DLive @OfficialDLive By the end of 2019, after BTT completed the acquisition of the Lino & DLive project and team, core members  including Wilson Wei , Ryan Li , Charles Wayn (Wang Jiaxi), and Shiyu Zhang ,Harry Zhang（Haoran) only stayed at BTT for about a year before leaving. They eventually split into two separate teams and embarked on their next round of token launches（ $G @Galxe and  $CYBER @BuildOnCyber）, conveniently leaving behind what was essentially an empty shell project with no real users for Justin Sun. In other words, at this point  Wilson Wei @WilsonWei777 appears to be the one taking the fall for Ryan Li @ryanli , Charles Wayn @charleswayn , and Shiyu Zhang @shiyuSQ,Harry Zhang @harryhrz . A bit more info about  Wilson Wei: This has already escalated into a criminal case. In mainland China ，pre-trial detention does not exceed one month. After formal arrest approval under normal circumstances, the investigation detention period typically lasts no longer than two months. However, Wilson Wei  has now been held for nearly three months, which usually suggests that investigators believe the evidence is relatively clear and substantial. The likelihood of a conviction and prison sentence is therefore quite high. Figure 1 Wilson Wei , Ryan Li , Shiyu Zhang Figure 2 Charles Wayn, Harry Zhang @multicoin @animocabrands @hashed_official @DraperDragon @incecapital @smrti_lab @IOSGVC @Delphi_Digital @protocollabs @TheSpartanGroup @FoliusVentures @blockchain @dragonfly_xyz @SolanaVentures @jumpcapital @lattice_fund @shimacapital @zachxbt @mrblock @HsakaTrades @PixOnChain @Polymarket @FareaNFts @AshCrypto @Cointelegraph @TheBlockCo @100trillionUSD @tier10k @Tree_of_Alpha @DegenSpartan @Icebergy @arkham @arndxt_xo @alpackaP @blknoiz06 @dlnews