The decentralized cross-chain exchange THORSwap has signed a $3.75 million private token sale backed by leading investment funds in the blockchain industry, providing further evidence that investors are keen to support market-ready DeFi platforms.
THORSwap will use the funding to continue building its development and operational resources, including launching new products on top of THORChain, the decentralized liquidity network that powers the exchange. IDEO CoLab Ventures led the sale of private tokens with participation from True Ventures, Sanctor Capital, Nine Realms, Proof Group, 0xVentures, Qi Capital, THORChain, and others.
THORSwap currently supports Bitcoin (BTC), Bitcoin Cash (BCH), Litecoin (LTC), Ether (ETH), Binance Coin (BNB), ERC-20 and BEP-20.
The platform also announced that a THOR token generation event will be held later this month.
The launch of THORChain in April was well received by the crypto community, with Erik Voorhees, CEO of ShapeShift, calling it a defining moment for the industry. “Thorchain has no bridges. No wrapping. They are authentic assets, exchanged across chains in a decentralized manner, for the first time ever.”
Decentralized exchanges have been a major catalyst for the massive growth of DeFi over the past year. By June, DEXs accounted for 13% of crypto trading volumes, up from just 6% in February. As Cointelegraph reported, DEX trade volume tripled between January and May, reaching $300 billion. At the same time, DeFi adoption continued to rise, with Uniswap and 1-inch registering 2.5 million and 600,000 unique users, respectively.
However, DEXs and other DeFi protocols have been a primary target of sophisticated cybercriminals and attackers. As Cointelegraph reported, THORChain faced a complex attack over the summer that resulted in a loss of $8 million in Ether. Fortunately, the attacker only wanted to expose the security flaw in exchange for a 10% payout.
Related: SEC is said to investigate the Uniswap decentralized exchange
Meanwhile, in August, DeFi Cream Finance’s $19 million lending protocol was drained in a quick loan attack. By taking the help of DeFi security platform, Cream Finance was able to recover most of the lost money.
