PANAMA CITY, Sept. 19, 2025 -- Grvt, the preeminent DEX (decentralized exchange) for onchain financial privacy that is powered by zero-knowledge ("ZK") technology, today announced the close of a $19 million Series A funding round. This investment strengthens Grvt's pioneering position as the global blueprint for the future of finance, accelerating its mission to disrupt the fragmented onchain finance ecosystem by addressing longstanding industry challenges, including privacy vulnerabilities, security, scalability and accessibility.
As Wall Street embraces blockchain technology, the next chapter of global finance is being written, and it's happening onchain. In August, Ethereum's onchain volume reached over $320 billion, its highest level since mid-2021. Research also projects the DeFi sector to surge from $32.36 billion in 2025 to over $1.5 trillion by 2034.
However, this potential remains untapped due to critical concerns raised by a surge of issues on decentralized platforms. These issues include "whale hunting", where large trades are front-run or exploited by sophisticated actors scanning the mempool. Such tactics lead to billions in annual losses from maximum extractable value (MEV) attacks and other manipulative tactics. Further challenges include smart contract exploits, compliance hurdles on public chains, a siloed onchain ecosystem, and a lack of ease of use for everyday people.
Grvt is the only player in the field with a solid head start and tech infrastructure to change that. The Series A round was co-led by Grvt's foundational technology partner ZKsync; Further Ventures, a leading capital markets infrastructure investment firm based in Abu Dhabi, which also led the strategic investment round into Grvt (deal closed last December); EigenCloud (fka EigenLayer), a verifiable cloud platform that lets developers build any application; and 500 Global (formerly 500 Startups), a venture capital firm with $2.3B in AUM investing in founders with a global outlook building fast-growing startups.
Majority of the funds raised will accelerate Grvt's multi-pronged product strategy, designed to serve both active traders and passive investors. This unique approach is absent from the current exchange scene, solidifying Grvt's unrivaled position to dominate and unify the fragmented onchain financial landscape and bring it to mainstream. Key pipelines include:
- Fixed Yield Generation Flywheel: An industry-first yield vehicle that lets users effortlessly move funds between their funding, trading, and vault accounts, and maximize returns.
- Infrastructure: Keep strengthening Grvt's privacy-by-default infrastructure which is lacking in the industry.
- Stablecoin-Enabled System: A robust stablecoin business foundation, including cross-exchange vaults and real-world asset (RWA) integrations.
The remaining funds will fuel community initiatives and talent acquisition to drive global expansion.
Hong Yea, co-founder and CEO at Grvt, commented: "Onchain finance has been held back by privacy gaps that expose users to exploitation. By building a privacy-driven, scalable, and trustless DEX that offers a wide array of structured products, Grvt exemplifies how ZK-powered solutions will become the new normal for everyone, realizing the vision of an open and secure onchain finance world."
Alex Gluchoski, co-founder and CEO at Matter Labs, commented: "We believe ZK is the 'HTTPS moment' for crypto. Just as HTTPS took the internet mainstream by adding a layer of trust and privacy, ZK will do the same for Web3. Grvt is uniquely positioned to be the most liquid and impactful application layer to help realize this vision, their dedication and progress excellently demonstrates how ZK can bring onchain finance to mainstream."
Faisal Al Hammadi, Managing Partner, Further Ventures, "Further Ventures is committed to backing the next generation of financial infrastructure from Abu Dhabi to the world. Grvt's application of zero-knowledge proofs demonstrates how cutting-edge cryptography can underpin markets at institutional scale, and we are proud to support their vision for a truly borderless financial system."
Sreeram Kannan, Founder and CEO at Eigen Labs, "Verifiable data powers verifiable compute, and with EigenDA now at 100 MB/s, the bottleneck has shifted from data to compute. Grvt is tackling that frontier head-on. Their ambitious vision is matched by the caliber of their team, and we're thrilled to back them alongside ZKSync in bringing onchain finance to cloud scale with the security and privacy it requires."
Min Kim, General Partner at 500 Global, commented: "We believe the next frontier of finance will be built onchain, and privacy is a foundational element to unlock its full potential. Grvt's vision of combining ZK technology with institutional-grade infrastructure aligns strongly with our thesis of backing global founders who are re-architecting core financial systems. We're excited to partner with Grvt as they set a new standard for secure, private, and accessible onchain markets."
A Collective Charge to Lead and Consolidate Onchain Finance
By implementing zero-knowledge ("ZK") technology and integrating with the ZKsync technology which has been explored in proofs-of-concept by leading institutions like Deutsche Bank, UBS and more, Grvt is uniquely positioned as a blockchain-native global blueprint for what ZK is able to achieve for finance, making everyday trading and investing secure, fast, private, and accessible. This is how the ZKsync Stack helps solve key bottlenecks when bringing finance onchain:
- Privacy: Grvt runs a ZKsync Validium L2 blockchain that validates L2 state without publishing it, thereby ensuring privacy, an issue that has long plagued most DeFi protocols.
- Ethereum-level Security: With ZK proofs, L2 transactions inherit Ethereum-level security. Every batch of transactions is verified directly on Ethereum, this means that even though transactions are processed off-chain for speed and low cost, their validity is mathematically guaranteed. If any transaction were invalid, the proof would fail and Ethereum would reject it.
- Scalability: The ZKsync Stack improves scalability by operating as a L2 solution, enabling the processing of significantly more transactions than Ethereum's base layer.
- Accessibility: ZKsync technology makes transactions cheaper by handling them off-chain in bulk and only posting the essential proofs to Ethereum's base layer, cutting settlement costs dramatically.
As a key investment arm of Abu Dhabi's strategic push into the blockchain space, Further Ventures' co-leadership of the Series A round consolidates its leading position as a critical force in shaping onchain finance globally.
As one of the fastest-growing developer ecosystems in crypto, EigenCloud's EigenDA, the #1 data availability solution for Ethereum rollups, provides Grvt with the scale and security needed to operate at cloud speed. By anchoring data to a decentralized validator network, EigenDA ensures that Grvt's ZK stack remains both verifiable and scalable. Looking ahead, Grvt will also tap into EigenDA's programmable privacy features, which resolve the long-standing paradox between data availability and privacy. This breakthrough allows Grvt to combine data availability with privacy guarantees, an achievement once thought impossible.
Looking Ahead
Building on Grvt's innovative foundation, which has already delivered several industry firsts – such as a -1 bps maker fee rebate for all maker orders (a benefit traditionally reserved for institutions) – the immediate next step is the launch of our fixed-yield product. This product will ensure a 10% interest rate return for all users. We will also introduce our flagship market-making strategy, the Grvt Liquidity Provider (GLP), a fund strategy that provides high double-digit APRs, which was once inaccessible to retail traders.
Amid the industry's rapid growth, this funding round establishes a robust, multi-layered foundation. It combines cutting-edge technology, institutional-grade infrastructure, and a secure data framework to create a platform that solidifies its strong position in the increasingly crowded onchain financial space.
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Grvt Strategies: Grvt provides technology solutions and smart contract infrastructure for digital asset management but does not offer financial, investment, or advisory services. Grvt does not endorse, recommend, or guarantee the performance or suitability of any investment strategies made available through the Strategies platform. All investment strategies are developed and managed independently by third-party strategy providers. Grvt does not assume any responsibility or liability for the performance of such strategies or any losses incurred by users. Users are solely responsible for evaluating and accepting the risks associated with any investment decisions made through the Strategies platform.
About Grvt
Grvt (pronounced "gravity") is an onchain financial platform built on the ZKsync Stack that ensures private, trustless, scalable and secure infrastructure. Through its decentralized exchange ("Grvt Exchange") and investment marketplace ("Grvt Strategies"), Grvt enables everyday people to trade, invest, and grow wealth transparently alongside world-class professionals.
Grvt official website: https://Grvt.io/
Social and Community: X | LinkedIn | Telegram | Discord
About ZKsync
ZKsync is the pioneering ZK technology powering the next generation of builders with limitless scale. Secured by math and designed for native interoperability, ZKsync enables the Elastic Network—an ever-expanding network of customizable chains.
Your gateway to the accelerating digital economy, ZKsync is used by leading banks, institutions, and companies to future-proof their financial infrastructure. Built on Ethereum, ZKsync delivers the privacy, scalability, and compliance needed to issue assets, power payments, and launch new financial products—giving you a secure foundation to grow with confidence.
About Further Ventures
Further Ventures builds and invests in companies shaping the future of financial markets.
Through a global platform rooted in emerging economies, Further connects next-generation financial infrastructure with global capital markets. Our portfolio companies enable institutional partners to securely store and transfer assets, trade structured products, secure decentralized networks, tokenize funds, and settle complex transactions with trustless precision.
From San Francisco to Hong Kong, founders choose Further as their institutional co-founder of choice. We make concentrated capital commitments, collaborate closely with regulators, and bring deep domain expertise to build category-defining companies at the frontier of finance.
Website: further.ae
About EigenCloud
EigenCloud is a developer cloud platform that lets developers build any application onchain or offchain, with cryptoeconomic trust. It is powered by the EIGEN token and secured by Ethereum; it unifies data, compute, and verification into a single developer experience, making anything verifiable onchain.
About 500 Global
500 Global is a venture capital firm with $2.3 billion in assets under management that invests early in founders building fast-growing technology companies. Since its inception, 500 Global has backed over 2,700 companies across 80+ countries, including 51+ unicorns such as Credit Karma, Canva, Grab, Bukalapak, GitLab, Solana, and Udemy. With a team of more than 190 professionals representing 25 nationalities, 500 Global is committed to uplifting people and economies around the world through entrepreneurship.
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