Chainalysis has crypto’s ‘heightened momentum’ to thank for multibillion-dollar valuation

The company recently raised $100M in VC funds. How does it plan to spend that money?

Blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis recently added $100 million to its books thanks to investments from a number of parties, including Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff.

In a report from CNBC on Friday, Chainalysis CEO Michael Gronager suggested that the success of this fundraising round was due to a feeling of “heightened momentum” in the cryptocurrency space.

“Chainalysis, the blockchain analysis company, today announced it secured a $100 million Series D financing led by Paradigm, bringing its valuation to over $2 billion,” the company said on Friday in a statement provided to Cointelegraph. “Previous investors Addition and Ribbit increased their investment in the company, and TIME Ventures, the investment fund for Marc Benioff, also participated.”

When asked what the project intends to use its newly acquired funds for, Chainalysis’ senior director of communications, Maddie Kennedy, told Cointelegraph, “We’re using the funds to expand our enterprise data offering,” adding that:

“We’ll continue to invest in investigations and compliance software, but we’ll also build out new data products both for our existing customer base and new audiences.”

Chainalysis will also focus on crypto businesses, asset managers, financial service providers, government agencies and more as it builds new solutions, Kennedy explained.

Since crypto’s inception more than a decade ago, governments have stepped up their activity in the industry, looking to provide greater clarity and regulatory enforcement. Kennedy seems to feel that a certain level of governmental oversight is good for adoption of the technology:

“Working with government agencies and demonstrating cryptocurrency’s transparency has helped bring cryptocurrency into the mainstream. Once regulators and law enforcement are comfortable with crypto, financial institutions and major corporations can invest in it too. We’re proud to have collaborated with our customers and partners across government and commercial enterprises to make cryptocurrency a legitimate and trusted part of the global financial system.”

Back in September 2020, Chainalysis won a $625,000 deal with the United States Internal Revenue Service for services that track anonymity-focused Monero (XMR) transactions.