August Raises $25M to Connect Institutional Investors with DeFi Protocols

August works with large financial institutions, such as hedge funds and family offices that are looking for yields and returns on their crypto investments

August, a startup offering crypto financial services to large institutions, has raised $25 million in a Series A funding round led by Point72 Ventures and Wing Venture Capital, with participation from existing seed investor Distributed Capital. The startup, which boasts 70 DeFi protocols and 13 blockchains on its platform, aims to be the central hub for institutional investors engaging with Web3.

"We work with large financial institutions, such as hedge funds and family offices that are looking for yields and returns on their crypto investments, through lending, borrowing, and trading," August co-CEO Aya Kantorovich told Fortune. "Our goal is to be the first place they go."

While August integrates with 70 DeFi protocols—sets of rules and smart contracts that help traders conduct transactions without a centralized entity like a bank—and 13 blockchains, Kantorovich wants to eliminate the confusion that comes with deciding which one to use. When you think about institutions, you want to get rid of this idea of or abstract away both chains and protocols. You just want to have one place.”

August seeks to connect clients with DeFi networks like Aave, Morpho, and Uniswap, which lend crypto and offer derivative and token trading. The startup also aims to help clients monitor all of their positions from a single dashboard.

That makes August a middleman of sorts. However, Kantorovich says that because August has access to clients’ positions the company can let clients pay for their loans, derivative positions, and trades all at once instead of putting money down for each individual position. “We aggregate all the positions and the clients just fund one big vault on a daily basis.”

August generates most of its revenue through trading spreads—money made off the difference between the price a token is bought at and the price it is sold at—and also charges its clients trading fees on each transaction. Kantorovich declined to disclose the company’s annual revenue.

August is not the only crypto-focused prime brokerage. Coinbase (COIN) has a division that caters specifically to large institutional clients known as Coinbase Prime. FalconX is another well-known brokerage in the space.

August will use the money from its latest fundraising to build out its marketing strategy, hire more employees, and continue developing new technology. The company previously raised $6 million in a seed round earlier this year.