Crypto Journalist

Amin Ayan

Crypto Journalist

Amin Ayan

About Author

Amin Ayan is a crypto journalist with over four years of experience in the industry. He has contributed to leading publications such as Cryptonews, Investing.com, 99Bitcoins, and 24/7 Wall St. He has…

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September 4, 2025

Ethereum-focused firm Etherealize has secured $40 million in fresh funding as it ramps up efforts to bring the second-largest cryptocurrency to Wall Street’s doorstep.

The raise, led by Electric Capital and Paradigm, aims to deepen institutional understanding of Ethereum and accelerate its adoption across traditional finance.

The funding round arrives during a pivotal week for Ethereum, with public firms collectively adding over $1.2 billion worth of Ether (ETH) to their treasuries, a surge that underscores growing institutional appetite for the asset.

Etherealize Aims to Bridge Ethereum and Wall Street

Etherealize, launched in January with backing from the Ethereum Foundation and co-founder Vitalik Buterin, is designed to bridge the gap between Ethereum’s complex ecosystem and the financial world’s demand for clarity, tools, and regulation-ready infrastructure.

Co-founder Grant Hummer previously noted that despite Ethereum’s presence in crypto ETFs, many institutions still lack the fundamental knowledge needed to engage meaningfully with ETH.

The $40 million will fund new tools and platforms tailored to institutional workflows. Etherealize plans to build infrastructure for private trading and settlement of tokenized assets, including a settlement platform for tokenized bonds and other fixed income products.

The firm is positioning itself at the intersection of crypto-native innovation and enterprise-level finance, hoping to deliver scalable solutions for firms seeking exposure to Ethereum’s capabilities.

“Over the past decade, Ethereum has gone from an experiment to the world’s most battle-tested, open financial network,” said co-founder Danny Ryan, adding that the new capital will help “upgrade institutional finance to modern, safer, globally accessible rails.”

The raise comes as Ethereum sees renewed momentum among public companies.

The Ether Machine, a crypto treasury firm planning a public listing, led this week’s accumulation with a 150,000 ETH buy, valued at $654 million.

Meanwhile, BitMine Immersion Technologies, Ethereum’s largest corporate holder, added another $65 million in ETH on Wednesday alone, per data from Arkham.

Other firms followed suit. Sharplink Gaming and Yunfeng Financial disclosed ETH purchases worth $176 million and $44 million, respectively.

Joseph Lubin Predicts 100x ETH Surge

Ethereum co-founder Joseph Lubin believes ETH could rally 100x or more over time, calling it Wall Street’s future infrastructure as TradFi shifts toward decentralized finance.

In an X post, Lubin said Ethereum will replace many siloed systems at institutions like JPMorgan and become the backbone for financial services, staking, and smart contract execution.

Backing the bullish stance of Fundstrat’s Tom Lee, Lubin stated he’s “100% aligned” with Lee’s view that Ethereum could flip Bitcoin in network value.

He compared the moment to 1971 when the U.S. dollar left the gold standard, signaling a tectonic shift in financial architecture led by Ethereum.

Likewise, Lee has predicted that Ethereum will rally in the near term to $5,500, with an ambitious year-end target of $12,000.

During his August 26 guest appearance on the Amitis Investing program, Lee disclosed that institutional Wall Street sentiment toward Ethereum has shifted dramatically following the U.S. Senate’s passage of the GENIUS Stablecoin legislation.

Lee emphasized that Ethereum is the foundational blockchain infrastructure for traditional finance (TradFi), currently supporting over $145 billion in stablecoin supply.

XRP futures became the fastest contract in CME Group history to cross $1 billion in open interest (OI), achieving the milestone in just over three months.

CME Group reported its crypto futures suite surpassed $30 billion in notional open interest for the first time, with XRP and Solana futures each crossing the $1 billion threshold. Additionally, Ethereum reached the OI record of $10.5 billion.

The derivatives exchange stated:

“Our Crypto futures suite just surpassed $30B in notional open interest for the first time ever. Our SOL and XRP futures, along with ETH options, each crossed $1B in OI, with XRP being the fastest-ever contract to do so, hitting the mark in just over 3 months.”

Strong trading activity

XRP futures recorded their largest daily volume since July 15 on Aug. 25, with 7,533 contracts traded and over $1 billion in total volume, according to CME data.

The activity demonstrates appetite for regulated XRP exposure through CME’s CFTC-supervised platform.

The milestone comes as traditional finance firms seek cryptocurrency derivatives products. CME launched XRP futures in May 2025, providing institutions with standardized contracts settling to the CME CF XRP-Dollar Reference Rate.

Nate Geraci, president of NovaDius Wealth, connected the futures activity to potential spot ETF demand on Aug. 26.

He said:

“CME Group says XRP futures contracts have crossed over $1 billion in open interest… Fastest-ever contract to do so (took just over 3mos). There’s already $800+mil in futures-based xrp ETFs. Think people might be underestimating demand for spot xrp ETFs.”

After the CME XRP futures launch on May 19, Geraci noted that spot ETFs were only a matter of time. The affirmation is likely because analysts view regulated futures markets as a crucial requirement for spot crypto ETF approvals.

Several asset managers have filed for spot XRP ETFs with the SEC, including applications from 21Shares, Bitwise, Canary Capital, and Grayscale.

CME’s crypto derivatives now include Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, and XRP. BTC futures account for the largest share, with over $16 billion in open interest, while Ethereum futures hold approximately $10.5 billion. Additionally, both XRP and Solana recently joined the billion-dollar club.

The $30 billion milestone represents institutional adoption of crypto derivatives as portfolio management tools.

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The two companies also set up a new business, Music IP Holdings Inc., which will handle the licensing of these patents and related technologies.

UMG has been developing AI tools since 2020 to support artist promotion, data analysis, and distribution. This latest step is meant to speed up the process of filing and licensing patents while freeing up UMG’s teams to focus on developing products.

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So far, UMG has filed 15 patent applications through Liquidax. The patents cover a range of areas including tools for protecting against AI misuse, systems that allow artists to create music collaboratively with AI, software for running marketing campaigns, audio-based health tools, and better ways to manage music rights and royalties.

Music IP Holdings will streamline the licensing process for these inventions worldwide by centralizing it under one entity.

Chris Horton, UMG’s Senior Vice President for Strategic Technology, explained that the company is committed to driving innovation and building on its long history of research, development, and successful patents.

Daniel Drolet, founder of Liquidax and partner in Music IP Holdings, added:

We are laser focused on advancing UMG’s leadership and their cutting-edge technologies, especially AI, to empower their artists, protect creative rights, foster partnerships, and enhance UMG’s fan experiences worldwide.

Recently, Grammarly, a grammar checking platform, acquired the artificial intelligence (AI) email app Superhuman. What is the goal of the acquisition? Read the full story.

Crypto Journalist

Amin Ayan

Crypto Journalist

Amin Ayan

About Author

Amin Ayan is a crypto journalist with over four years of experience in the industry. He has contributed to leading publications such as Cryptonews, Investing.com, 99Bitcoins, and 24/7 Wall St. He has…

Share

Last updated: 

July 22, 2025

Singapore-headquartered edtech firm Genius Group has doubled its Bitcoin holdings to 200 BTC after acquiring 20 BTC last week, part of a wider strategy to build a 10,000-BTC treasury.

The latest purchase, announced Tuesday, was made at an average price of $106,812 per BTC, significantly below the market range of $117,000 to $120,600 that day, per Nansen data.

The $2.14 million acquisition brought Genius Group’s total Bitcoin reserve to $2.35 million in value at the time of writing, with an unrealized gain of $216,000.

Genius Group Makes Fourth Bitcoin Purchase in July

It’s the company’s fourth purchase this month, following acquisitions of 20 BTC on July 2, 28 BTC on July 8, and 32 BTC on July 13, according to BitcoinTreasuries.NET.

Genius Group aims to scale its holdings to 1,000 BTC by the end of 2025, eventually hitting 10,000 BTC over two years.

The initiative is supported by U.S. legislative developments, particularly the Government Evaluation of New Innovations in the United States (GENIUS) Act, which the firm says will enable the expansion of its blockchain-based learning ecosystem.

Part of that ecosystem is Genius Academy, a blockchain-powered platform where students earn Genius Education Merits (GEMs), tokens equivalent to one satoshi.

Though not currently convertible to fiat or crypto, GEMs function like airline points and may become part of a stablecoin system pending regulatory approvals.

The company is pursuing a Permitted Payment Stablecoin Issuer (PPSI) license and a separate Digital Asset Service Provider (DASP) license.

The licenses would allow Genius Group to tokenize GEMs into a usable digital currency within its platform and facilitate stablecoin payments to educators and partners.

It also plans to develop on-chain course certifications recognized as regulated digital assets, granting educators blockchain-based IP rights.

Genius Group’s broader vision includes real-world integration: retreats and accelerators where participants can pay using GEMs or the future stablecoin for services like lodging and meals.

Ethereum Poised to Gain Most From GENIUS Act

Meanwhile, Ethereum stands to benefit most from the GENIUS Act, according to Ether Machine CEO Andrew Keys, who noted that “90% of tokenized assets and stablecoins are deployed on Ethereum.”

He likened Ethereum’s dominance in tokenization to Google’s in internet search, citing its infrastructure’s role in making the stablecoin ecosystem possible.

Public companies are increasingly adding altcoins like Ether (ETH), Solana’s SOL, and XRP to their treasury strategies, according to a report from Animoca Brands Research.

Michael Saylor’s Strategy popularized this model by holding over 600,000 Bitcoins as a hedge against inflation and currency devaluation.

Just recently, BIT Mining announced plans to raise between $200 million and $300 million to build a Solana (SOL) treasury as part of a broader expansion into the fast-growing blockchain ecosystem.

Last week, DeFi Development Corp. revealed that it has acquired $2.7 million worth of Solana as part of its aggressive crypto treasury strategy.

The international arm of Ant Group, the company backed by Alibaba founder Jack Ma, plans to bring Circle’s USDC stablecoin onto its proprietary blockchain.

The rollout will start once U.S. regulators certify the dollar-pegged token under the new federal rules, Bloomberg reported, citing people familiar with the deal.

The move would give USDC a link to a network that processed more than $1 trillion in global payments last year, a third of them settled on-chain. That scale could make Ant the largest overseas corporate user of a U.S.-issued stablecoin.

Ant International is also applying for stablecoin licenses in Singapore, Hong Kong and Luxembourg, according to the report. The group wants regulated digital dollars, central bank digital currencies and tokenized bank deposits to sit side by side on its platform.

The company’s blockchain currently supports tokenized assets from various financial institutions and has reportedly been working with the People’s Bank of China (PBOC) on the country’s central bank digital currency (CBDC), the digital yuan.

Circle shares rose nearly 3.8% in pre-market trading to $208.