GCR

DeFi Fixed Rate Protocol Element Finance raises $32M Series A from Polychain Capital & Andreessen Horowitz at a $320M Valuation

Element Finance announced today the closing of their $32 million Series A round led by Polychain Capital. The round includes previous investors Andreessen Horowitz, Placeholder, A_Capital, and Scalar Capital. New investors in the round included Republic, Advanced Blockchain, P2P Validator, Rarestone, Ethereal Ventures, and their limited partners. 

The round was also joined by Rune Christensen (MakerDAO), Stani Kulechov (Aave), Kain Warwick (Synthetix), Fernando Martinelli (Balancer), Hart Lambur (UMA Protocol), Alex Svanevik (Nansen), Julian Koh (Ribbon Finance), Zachary Cole (Slingshot), Mariano Conti (former MakerDAO), Cyrus Youness (former MakerDAO), Darren Lau and Daryl Lau (Not3Lau), Santiago Roel Santos, Anthony Sassano, David Hoffman, Ryan Sean Adams, Dean Eigenmann, Patrick LaVecchia, Will Price, Tracheopteryx, Marc Bhargava; and DeFi native funds, Femboy Capital, and Yunt Capital. 

Element Finance has built a new financial DeFi primitive that enables capital-efficient fixed and variable yield markets. Fixed rates are offered in a decentralized, open format with rates up to 15% on USD, Ethereum, or Bitcoin. Other projects can also develop new products or services by adopting its open-source infrastructure.

Since the Element Protocol launched on June 30th, Element has:

• Surpassed the $180 million total value-locked (TVL) milestone.
• Surpassed $70 million in trading volume.
• Launched terms for seven different asset classes, including USDC, DAI, and WBTC.
• Consistently provided the highest fixed-rate yields denominated in USD in the DeFi industry (Up to 13% on USD).
• Surpassed 9,000 active users.

Element Finance launched a Treasury Management initiative that allows DeFi projects, Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs), companies, institutions, and various other organizations to diversify their treasury management strategy with fixed yields. 

Element also remains focused on building its recently-introduced Governance system. The system introduces new governance primitives to the DeFi space by bringing more flexibility, empowerment, and scalability while successfully maintaining the security and robustness of the protocol. 

The funds raised in the Series A will help Element expand by growing its team across all areas of the project, primarily in its engineering, research, UI, and design departments.

“We are dedicated to fortifying, strengthening, and advancing both the DeFi and decentralized governance space. With this new fundraise, we will continue to grow and bring more value to DeFi, contribute significantly towards research, and introduce more primitives to the space. Fixed rates are a stepping stone for more participants to come into the world of DeFi and we’re excited to play a role in that.”

Will Villanueva, Co-Founder & CEO, Element

“Element is a breakthrough financial primitive that has quickly become a cornerstone of DeFi, and soon we think will be a core piece of our global financial infrastructure. Polychain is excited to be partnering with this superb team to help accelerate the protocol’s growth and adoption.”

Olaf Carlson-Wee, Founder & CEO of Polychain Capital

“On Wall Street, value flows inward to institutions at the center. In DeFi, value flows outward to people at the edges. Element extends DeFi to new financial services, creating new and remixed capabilities to help shape the future of finance. They’re innovating at a rapid pace and their founders have the ambition and expertise to keep Element at the cutting edge for years to come.”

Chris Dixon, General Partner, Andreessen Horowitz

To stay updated on Element’s progress, follow us on Twitter, Discord, LinkedIn, and Telegram.

For more information, contact Sebastian Aldasoro via email at sebastian@element.fi, or Telegram @saldasoro.

You can download Element’s logo from Element’s Media Kit, which will be uploaded to Element Finance’s website shortly.