Global venture funding to financial technology startups totaled $12 billion across 751 deals in 2026 as of April 6, per Crunchbase . That’s a 5% increase in dollars raised compared to the $11.4 billion raised across 1,097 — or 31.5% fewer — deals during the same time period in 2025.

This trend signals larger deal sizes. Indeed, late-stage or growth funding in the first quarter of 2026 totaled $6.9 billion, up 8% compared to $6.4 billion raised at those stages in the 2025 first quarter.

However, sequentially, the $12 billion raised is down 33% compared to the fourth quarter of 2025, when fintech startups raised $17.8 billion globally. The $6.9 billion raised in late-stage or growth funding is also down markedly — by 43% — compared to the $12.1 billion raised by fintech startups in Q4 2025.

The trend in the first quarter also mirrors what we saw in 2025 as a whole, with global venture funding to fintech startups climbing to its highest level in several quarters, boosted by later-stage deals.

Total global funding to VC-backed financial technology startups totaled $53.8 billion in 2025, per Crunchbase . That’s an approximately 29.3% increase from 2024’s total of $41.6 billion raised.

US booms

U.S.-based startups have historically raised more fintech funding than any other country in the world, and the first quarter of 2026 was no different.

Of the $12 billion raised by startups globally, just over half — or $6.3 billion — flowed to fintech companies based in the U.S. That was an impressive 47% increase compared to the $4.3 billion raised by U.S. fintech startups in the 2025 first quarter. However, it was down 50% from the $12.6 billion that U.S. financial technology startups raised in the fourth quarter of 2025.

The United Kingdom was the second-largest recipient of venture capital, with startups in the region raising a total of $1.2 billion. India came in third, raising $900 million.

Big deals for unicorns

Several fintech startups raised nine-figure rounds in the first quarter, with some doubling their valuations since their last venture financings.

Predictions marketplace was the largest recipient of capital in the first quarter. In March, the company doubled its valuation to $22 billion in just three months with a $1 billion raise led by . The New York-based startup had just raised $1 billion in Series E funding at an $11 billion valuation in December.

In February, , a digital savings platform, raised $385 million in a Series E funding round co-led by and . The New York-based startup said its new valuation was $2 billion, double it achieved when raising its $125 million Series D round in December 2023.

And in January, , which is building infrastructure for payments with stablecoins, raised $250 million in a Series C funding round led by . Its post-money valuation was $1.95 billion, up 17x from last March.

Investors remain bullish

, partner and head of U.S. at , said his firm has been investing at a slightly slower pace so far in 2026 than in years past. But he cited it as “more a quirk of deal flow” and where it gets conviction, rather than a decision to slow the firm’s investing pace.

“It’s certainly true that macroeconomics and geopolitics play a role,” he told Crunchbase News, “but mostly we’re just focused on finding high-conviction companies to back.”

QED is extremely bullish on the application layer for AI in fintech and stablecoin opportunities, and has backed several startups that Gerety said “harness the power of LLMs with the security and reliability guarantees that finance needs.” (, which raised a $45 million Series B in January and is building an AI assistant for financial advisers, is one of those companies.)

“Just in the last few months, agents are now actually able to be effective in many processing tasks, but the stakes in finance are too high for LLMs to conquer financial workflows alone,” Gerety said. “Finance runs on trust, not probability.”

Looking ahead, he said QED remains bullish on fintech overall for the year. Part of the excitement is around the fact that larger companies are “transforming” their operations with agentic workflows, Gerety noted.

“More and more transformation is moving from the ‘co-pilot’ phase, and we’re moving into the ‘OpenClaw’ phase, when reasoning agents will start to actually do all the work that was too tedious and slow to be done manually,” he added.

The geopolitical situation will likely hinder some companies from taking the IPO plunge, in Gerety’s view, although a few companies in QED’s portfolios are “bubbling.”

, partner at , said his firm is on track to make eight to 10 core investments in Seed or Series A companies this year — about the same number as in previous years.

“We’re investing in AI-enabled applications while maintaining patience and focus in our deployment of capital,” he said. “We look for durable, enduring businesses that we believe will withstand the current hype cycle and investment frenzy.”

While TTV is investing in AI-enabled companies, Kapur said it also agrees with that “an AI reset is coming.”

“Many investors have already made their money by getting in on the ground floor, and others are trying to replicate their success,” he told Crunchbase News. “We’re focused on investing in the application layer of AI, and we’re still in the early days with more widespread prosperity and a democratization of enterprise value creation yet to come.”

In particular, TTV sees the biggest opportunity in early-stage AI-native companies that are solving problems in mission-critical workflows “while building durable moats.”

“These platforms will earn the right to be distribution endpoints for financial products … and are even more valuable in the age of AI,” he said.

He believes we may see some fintech IPOs in 2026, but that they will largely depend on how the potential mega IPOs (from the likes of , and ) perform.

“If those IPOs underperform, others may opt to stay private longer,” Kapur said.

Looking ahead, he predicts we’ll continue to see accelerated adoption of AI in financial services, first through straightforward applications, then more operationally complex use cases.

“More broadly, we’re watching how the foundational LLMs further move up into the application layer, which is imperative to the long-term sustainability of their business models,” Kapur said. “We think financial services and fintech are unique enough categories where de novo startups and standalone businesses will beat platforms building experimental applications.”

Related Crunchbase query:

Related reading:

• Fintech Funding Jumped 27% In 2025 With Fewer Deals But Bigger Checks
• Kalshi Secures $1B To Expand Predictions Market Platform
• Digital Savings Startup Vestwell Lands $385M, Doubles Valuation
• Stablecoin Startup Rain Raises $250M Series C at $1.95B Valuation – Its Third Round In Less Than A Year
• Exclusive: Zocks Raises $45M Series B From Lightspeed, QED For AI Assistant To Financial Advisers

Illustration:

For perspective, we charted out total investment, color-coded by stage, for the past 12 quarters below.

Of that total, $761 million went into late-stage and growth deals, up 158% compared to the $295 million that flowed into such deals in the first quarter of 2025. It’s also up 203% compared with the $251 million in late-stage and growth rounds that were raised by LatAm startups in the 2025 fourth quarter.

Table of contents

• Mexico leads
• Fewer deals
• Some big rounds
• Investor POV
• Methodology
• Glossary of funding terms

Mexico leads

Nearly one-third of the total amount raised in the first quarter went to one startup. Mexico City-based , an online used car marketplace, secured a $300 million Series F financing led by and in February.

Notably, mostly due to that outsized round, Mexican startups outperformed their Brazilian counterparts in the first quarter, raising a total of $404 million compared to Brazil’s $240 million.

Historically, Brazil has been the powerhouse in Latin America for venture capital funding. But it’s not the first time in recent quarters that Mexico has topped Latin America’s largest country. Mexico also raised more funding in the second quarter of 2025.

Overall, the first quarter marks only the second time since Q2 2012 that Mexican startups raised more venture capital than their Brazilian counterparts in Latin America, our data indicates.

Fewer deals

Round counts and total dollars raised decreased substantially sequentially and year over year across angel, seed and early stages. Of the $1.03 billion raised by Latin America’s startups in the first quarter, less than 9% — or $92 million — was raised across the angel and seed stages.

That compares to $161 million raised across those stages in the fourth quarter of 2025, and $152 million in the same first quarter last year.

Just over 17%, or $179 million, was raised at early stages, significantly lower than the $690 million raised in the fourth quarter and $472 million in the same period last year.

We expect the Q1 deal counts to rise somewhat over time, however, as seed rounds in particular are commonly reported weeks or months after they close.

Some big rounds

While Kavak’s round was the largest financing in Latin America in the first quarter, it was not the only nine-figure raise the region saw in Q1.

Argentinian fintech raised $195 million at a $3.2 billion valuation in March in a round led by .

Other large deals that took place in Q1 include:

• Mexico City-based , a financial app built around stablecoins, raised $70 million in a round co-led by and .
• Buenos Aires-based , a payments infrastructure startup, landed a $55 million Series C financing co-led by and.

Notably, the largest rounds included participation from high-profile global funds, including Andreessen Horowitz, Founders Fund, Sequoia Capital and Insight Partners.

Investor POV

, managing partner of New York-based , said his firm has made more than 60 investments in Latin America since 2022 — steadily increasing its investment pace every year from 11 deals in the region in 2023 to 20 in 2025.

In his view, many of the global investors who began putting more funding into Latin America’s startups in recent years are still writing checks there. However, he acknowledges that some “momentum” investors have slowed down.

Still, “almost all of the long-term smart capital investors have remained very active,” he said.

Last year was “all about stablecoins and fintech infrastructure” for the region. We should expect more of that this year, along with increased AI use across all sectors and strong enterprise growth in Brazil, he told Crunchbase News.

Brazil continues to be Endeavor Catalyst’s top market, but it is watching startups across the region, including in countries such as Mexico, Argentina, Colombia, Chile and even smaller markets such as Ecuador, Peru and Uruguay.

Endeavor Catalyst has reason to be bullish on Latin America. Startups it has backed in the region are among the top performers of the firm’s portfolio. More than one-third (34%) of its 2026 Outlier class, which comprise roughly the top 10% best performers in its network, are from Latin America, according to Taylor.

, general partner at São Paulo-based seed-stage firm , told Crunchbase News that his firm’s pace in Latin America has remained constant and “intentionally selective.”

“We’ve always believed that seed in Latin America works best when you’re deeply involved with a small number of exceptional founders and not try to index the market,” he noted.

But like many other investors, OneVC is also investing at an earlier stage.

“One notable shift is that, as founding teams move faster than ever, often reaching product-market signal with leaner teams and AI-native tooling,” Cartolano said, “pre-seed is taking a larger share of our investments, and we expect that to continue being the case for this cycle.”

Like Endeavor Catalyst, Brazil is OneVC’s primary market. It has a home court advantage, but as Cartolano notes, the country also has a lot going for it including being the largest economy in Latin America, one of the world’s most active early-adopter communities for new technology (, -native commerce, AI), and a regulatory environment — particularly in financial services — which in his view “that fosters innovation”

As a secondary focus, interestingly, his firm is tracking an increasing number of strong Latino founders relocating to the United States to build companies.

“We like that,” he said. “They combine deep operational instincts from LatAm with access to the largest addressable market and most liquid exit environment.”

He agrees with Taylor that global interest appears to be renewing in Latin America startups.

“There is no shortage of capital for the best companies in the region, regardless of the state, and we are seeing some large firms investing in LatAm for the first time or coming back after a long period,” he said.

And while fintech has historically dominated when it comes to venture funding in Latin America, Cartolano said that fintech is now unsurprisingly giving way to AI-first companies that sell services, particularly to enterprises.

“The broader market is also shifting from consumer-facing models toward B2B, as enterprise companies are more incentivized than ever to adopt new technologies,” he added. “OneVC is especially focused on GenAI companies that ‘sell work,’ replacing headcount and outsourced services with AI-driven delivery at a fraction of the cost.

Related reading:

• In Q2, Mexico Surpasses Brazil In Venture Dollars For First Time In Over A Decade

Methodology

The data contained in this report comes directly from Crunchbase, and is based on reported data. Data is as of March 31, 2026.

Note that data lags are most pronounced at the earliest stages of venture activity, with seed funding amounts increasing significantly after the end of a quarter/year.

Please note that all funding values are given in U.S. dollars unless otherwise noted. Crunchbase converts foreign currencies to U.S. dollars at the prevailing spot rate from the date funding rounds, acquisitions, IPOs and other financial events are reported. Even if those events were added to Crunchbase long after the event was announced, foreign currency transactions are converted at the historic spot price.

Glossary of funding terms

Seed and angel consists of seed, pre-seed and angel rounds. Crunchbase also includes venture rounds of unknown series, equity crowdfunding and convertible notes at $3 million (USD or as-converted USD equivalent) or less.

Early-stage consists of Series A and Series B rounds, as well as other round types. Crunchbase includes venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $3 million, and those less than or equal to $15 million.

Late-stage consists of Series C, Series D, Series E and later-lettered venture rounds following the “Series [Letter]” naming convention. Also included are venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $15 million. Corporate rounds are only included if a company has raised an equity funding at seed through a venture series funding round.

Technology growth is a private-equity round raised by a company that has previously raised a “venture” round. (So basically, any round from the previously defined stages.)

Illustration:

U.S. and Canadian companies secured a staggering $252.6 billion in seed- through growth-stage funding rounds per Crunchbase data. That’s more than 3x the total raised in the prior quarter, and the largest quarterly total of all time.

Predictably, artificial intelligence was the driver. More than 87% of Q1 investment went to companies in Crunchbase AI-related categories.

To say these are record funding tallies is somewhat of an understatement. It’s more like Q1 smashed the prior quarterly record — $95.7 billion — set in Q3 2021.

Just a single financing for was bigger than the prior quarterly record for all startup funding rounds put together. And the four next-largest financings totaled almost as much as the prior quarter, which at the time we considered a very strong period for startup funding.

So, in summary, it was a lot of money. For a more detailed picture, we drill down more deeply into how that largesse was distributed across stages and sectors. We also take a look at exits for the quarter, including both IPOs and acquisitions.

Table of contents

• AI
• Later stage and technology growth
• Early stage
• Seed
• Exits
• Big picture: A paradigm shift
• Methodology
• Glossary of funding terms

AI

We’ll start with AI, since that’s where the overwhelming majority of the money went.

A staggering $221 billion went to North American companies in Crunchbase AI-related categories in the first quarter. That’s about 6x the AI investment total from the prior quarter, which was itself no slacker on this front.

For perspective, we charted out AI-related funding over the past 13 quarters to compare.

A few megarounds for high-profile companies accounted for most of the quarter’s AI funding, led by OpenAI, , and .

Later stage and technology growth

These same names factor heavily in tallies for late-stage and technology-growth funding, which comprised the vast majority of total startup investment.

Per Crunchbase data, $222.4 billion — or 88% of all North America startup investment — went to rounds at these stages. That’s more than 5x the prior quarter’s tally, and more than triple year-ago levels.

The gains were driven by bigger deals, not more of them. Later- and growth-stage round counts were actually down a smidge sequentially in Q1. For perspective, below we chart round counts and investment totals at this stage for the past five quarters.

Enormous rounds for AI companies accounted for a majority of the late- and growth-stage totals. The biggest of these was OpenAI’s record-setting $110 billion February financing led by , and . The generative AI giant topped it off with a raise in March.

Anthropic secured the quarter’s next-biggest late-stage financing — a $30 billion February Series G — followed by xAI, which announced a $20 billion Series E in January. landed another of the quarter’s very big deals, with a $16 billion February Series D.

Early stage

Early-stage investment was also running high in Q1, albeit not setting records.

Overall, investors put $25.1 billion into deals around Series A and Series B stage in the first quarter. That’s up 17% from the prior quarter and 56% from year-ago levels. It’s also the highest quarterly total in over three years, though still below peaks scaled in 2021.

Early-stage round counts, meanwhile, were down a bit, indicating investors’ increasingly concentrating their bets among perceived star performers.

As usual, a few jumbo-sized deals significantly boosted the early-stage totals. For Q1, this included four rounds of $500 million or more.

Of these, Austin-based humanoid robotics startup was the biggest fundraiser, pulling in $520 million in a February Series A. Three other companies secured $500 million financings: AI infrastructure developer , semiconductor startup , and industrial robotics-focused .

Seed

Seed-stage investment, meanwhile, did not show an upswing but remained at historically robust levels.

Per Crunchbase data, an estimated $5.1 billion went to seed and pre-seed investments in Q1. That’s roughly flat with the prior quarter and up a bit from year-ago levels.

Seed round counts declined in Q1, both sequentially and year over year. However, we expect these tallies to rise some over time, along with investment totals, as seed deals commonly get added to the data set weeks after they close.

Exits

Exit activity was fairly staid in comparison to the high-rolling startup fundraising environment.

That said, the IPO market did boast a few sizable startup debuts. Of these, the largest was the January IPO of construction equipment rental marketplace , followed by space tech company , and crypto platform .

Below, we aggregated a list of 12 private, venture-backed companies that carried out IPOs on U.S. exchanges.

Acquirers also announced several large deals to purchase venture-backed private companies.

The priciest planned M&A deal was ’s agreement to purchase business credit card provider for $5.15 billion. Biotech also delivered some large outcomes, including ’s planned acquisition of RNA therapeutics startup , and ’ purchase of allergy treatment startup .

Below, we put together a list of five of the quarter’s biggest M&A deals.1

Big picture: A paradigm shift

Having written many of these funding reports over the years, it’s common for one quarter to quietly blur into another. Not so for Q1 of 2026.

The just-ended quarter cemented a notion that startup insiders have been circling for some time: Private markets now have the capital stores and appetite for ultra-high valuations to rival public markets. For evidence, look no further than OpenAI’s $122 billion raise at a valuation higher than all but a handful of the largest large-cap technology companies.

IPO enthusiasts may pine for a future period when these most sought-after foundational AI names finally do make it to public markets. But for now, they’ve demonstrated there are plenty of investors willing to shell out billions in private offerings as well.

Related Crunchbase queries:

Methodology

The data contained in this report comes directly from Crunchbase, and is based on reported data. Data is as of March 31, 2026.

Note that data lags are most pronounced at the earliest stages of venture activity, with seed funding amounts increasing significantly after the end of a quarter/year.

Please note that all funding values are given in U.S. dollars unless otherwise noted. Crunchbase converts foreign currencies to U.S. dollars at the prevailing spot rate from the date funding rounds, acquisitions, IPOs and other financial events are reported. Even if those events were added to Crunchbase long after the event was announced, foreign currency transactions are converted at the historic spot price.

Glossary of funding terms

Seed and angel consists of seed, pre-seed and angel rounds. Crunchbase also includes venture rounds of unknown series, equity crowdfunding and convertible notes at $3 million (USD or as-converted USD equivalent) or less.

Early-stage consists of Series A and Series B rounds, as well as other round types. Crunchbase includes venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $3 million, and those less than or equal to $15 million.

Late-stage consists of Series C, Series D, Series E and later-lettered venture rounds following the “Series [Letter]” naming convention. Also included are venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $15 million. Corporate rounds are only included if a company has raised an equity funding at seed through a venture series funding round.

Technology growth is a private-equity round raised by a company that has previously raised a “venture” round. (So basically, any round from the previously defined stages.)

Illustration:

His career, which spans his time as founder of , DFJ and thehas also included high-profile missteps — most notably — underscoring the risk and volatility that goes along with making bold wagers.

A frequent personality on TV and social media, Draper is also known as a relentless champion for decentralized technology and a leading voice for bitcoin and blockchain. In 2024, he launched Draper TV, a media network, where he continues to host a global pitch competition called “Meet the Drapers.” The series, which is now entering its ninth season, invites viewers at home to invest alongside him in innovative startups.

Draper exudes an almost schoolboy-like enthusiasm and passion when it comes to startups, technology, bitcoin and innovation. I recently spoke with him — while he was sporting his favorite purple and gold bitcoin tie — to get his thoughts on everything from his use of digital twins, how the current AI boom compares to previous cycles, and how he wishes policymakers approached tech regulation.

This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.

Crunchbase News: What have you been up to lately? What’s occupying your time?

Draper: We are doing something interesting with — we’re joining them for something called America’s Startup. We’re going to do a business plan competition around the country for college students. It kind of dovetails into “Meet the Drapers.” is one of our sponsors, so we’re thinking about doing shows in “small bites” for them.

We’re also doing a lot with . This is the year we turn our distribution global. We had a reach of 300 million people, with 10 million seeing each episode, but we’re focusing on building the YouTube audience now because you get more control and understand the audience better.

Then there is . We’re building relationships with various countries that send their top students or potential entrepreneurs to us. People call it a “pre-accelerator,” but I call it a “human accelerator.” We accelerate the people — they have to accelerate their own business. We take them through very difficult challenges: a three-day hackathon and survival training with the Navy SEALs, special forces and the . Then they have a two-minute presentation to VCs.

You’re using “digital twins.” How are you actually deploying AI in your daily operations?

Yes, they are helping. They answer questions from entrepreneurs. On our site, they can talk with me or my digital twin, or they can send in a deck.

My team has built these in a few different ways. One is a hologram by Proto at Draper University. On our website, we have a twin created by Randy Adams that can talk to entrepreneurs. We even have an AI — built by an intern — that evaluates pitch decks and “spits out” feedback.

Beyond that, we use a tool called Seer that uses video to detect facial expressions; it can determine if an entrepreneur is passionate, lying or genuinely interesting. We’re also using a voice analysis tool — similar to how reportedly hires people based on specific “voice models” that match their desired personality types — to identify the “entrepreneurial voice.”

What do you think feels fundamentally different about the cycle that we’re in right now compared to previous ones?

Weirdly, I don’t see a big difference. It’s as big as the dot-com boom, maybe bigger. I call it the Draper iS curve. Every industry goes through this. There is a little “i” — that’s the hype. It comes to a point (the dot on the i), and then it comes down because people are disenchanted. It sits there while engineers are hard at work, and then it grows into a big “S” that goes way bigger than the top of the i.

It happened with the internet: 1999 was the climb, 2000 was the top, and 2001 was the crash. From 2001 to 2008, it grew into a huge boom. It’s happening with bitcoin now. And AI is right at the “dot” on the i or coming down off it. People are disenchanted because of energy issues, but it will eventually be bigger than anyone imagined, especially in robotics.

What’s the trend that you think right now might be a little bit overhyped? And what’s something that’s underestimated?

The quick answer is AI is overhyped, but I don’t believe that. Under-noticed is that Big Pharma would have you believe chemotherapies are the most important thing — that you create a molecule and use it forever, and then need another molecule for the side effects. We’re moving from chemotherapies to bio-cures: stem cells, cloning and genetic engineering.

Also, companies we used to call “space and transportation” are now called dual-use. The and governments are buying in because they realize they are way behind the commercial sector. And bitcoin is in that period where “nobody cares,” but it’s slowly taking over.

Do you see bitcoin actually replacing the dollar for daily use?

For now, nobody wants to spend it because they think it will be worth more. But eventually, retailers will say, “We only take bitcoin.” If that happens, there will be a run on the dollar.

People worry about quantum computing hacking bitcoin, but they’ll hack the banks first — it’s way easier. I’d be more concerned about money in a bank than on a bitcoin ledger. Bitcoin also keeps perfect records; we wouldn’t need 85,000 agents because the blockchain can just pay whoever needs to be paid.

Where do you think the biggest potential for returns in the AI space are? Tooling, vertical AI, AI-native companies?

One or two general AI companies will win big and become “hungry giants,” the way was for software or bitcoin is for tech applications. A lot of people working around the edges might just be acquired by the AGI. We’ve funded companies doing vertical AI: AI for patents, AI for science.

But remember, the big winners at the start of the internet were , and , and none of them ended up being a big part of the internet later. We don’t know who will rise from the ashes yet.

If you could implement one policy to accelerate innovation, what would that policy be?

Don’t regulate in anticipation of fearful outcomes. Regulate after something bad happens. Otherwise, you put a dark cloud over every innovator. I would also sunset laws. The ’33 and ’40 Acts are just keeping the poor poor and the rich rich. We should create a free market in education, too — let the best schools thrive and the worst die.

Some would argue in the case of bitcoin, we were slow to regulate. Do you disagree?

The U.S. just decided everything was a security and made it illegal. That’s why innovators are geofencing the U.S. to protect themselves from the ‘s long arms. Countries like El Salvador, Japan, Dubai and Abu Dhabi are rocking because they say “do it.”

I say decentralize everything. The guy at the tiller of the ship knows better than the general in Washington, D.C. You don’t want a president telling you how to raise your kids; you’ll do a better job than they will.

What’s the trait you now prioritize in founders that you didn’t a decade ago?

A love for the customer. It has to be an obsession. That love becomes a viral effect; customers love the product so much they tell everyone. People will naturally follow a leader who is that obsessed with their customer.

Illustration:

And underlining the pace at which some startups are now sprinting to billion-dollar-plus valuations, four of the new unicorns are less than a year old.

In exit news, 9-year-old fintech unicorn was acquired by for $5.2 billion. That’s well below its January 2022 valuation of $12.3 billion but still marks a win for earlier investors seeking liquidity.

Of the 31 companies that joined the board, 23 are U.S.-based and two hail from Canada. Germany, France, Belgium, Israel, Japan and India each added one new unicorn to the board last month.

Among sectors, AI and AI infrastructure contributed the most new unicorns, totaling nine from those two areas. The next-leading sectors, with three new unicorns each, were manufacturing and security propelled by AI. AI was also a major contributor to new unicorns in the semiconductor, defense and autonomous driving sectors.

The largest funding last month for a unicorn company was $20 billion to ’s at an . Within a month of that funding, xAI in early February announced a merger with another Musk-led company, rocketmaker .

11 exits

Brex’s acquisition by Capital One was the largest of the four M&A deals for unicorn-valued companies in January.

On the IPO side, seven companies went public, the most high-profile of which were and , both foundation AI model companies based in China.

Here are January’s newly minted unicorns.

AI

• , an AI research lab focused on human collaboration, raised a $480 million seed funding led by and 1. The less than 1-year-old Redwood City, California-based company was valued at $4.5 billion.
• , an AI scientific research lab, raised a $180 million seed round led by , and . The less than 1-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1.5 billion.
• AI evaluation platform raised a $150 million Series A led by 2�����Ի� . The less than 1-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1.7 billion.
• Voice AI startup raised a $143 million Series C led by France-based . The 10-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1.3 billion. As part of its announcement, Deepgram disclosed the acquisition of , a voice AI startup for restaurants and drive-thru ordering.
• , an infrastructure company for voice AI, raised a $100 million Series C led by . The 5-year-old San Jose, California-based company was valued at $1 billion.

AI infrastructure

• , an AI networking company, raised a $200 million Series A led by , and . The 1-year-old Santa Clara, California-based company was valued at $1 billion.
• GPU marketplace raised a $150 million Series B led by . The 2-year-old Palo Alto, California-based company was valued at $1 billion.
• , for secure AI run locally on devices, raised a Series A extension funding of an undisclosed sum. The 6-year-old Austin-based company was valued at $2.5 billion.
• , which manages a GPU marketplace, raised a Series C led by . The 6-year-old company was founded in Lithuania and is now headquartered in Miami. It was valued at $1 billion.

Manufacturing

• , a builder of factories for defense and the aerospace industry, raised a $131 million private equity funding led by . The 5-year-old Hawthorne, California-based company was valued at $1.6 billion.
• , a developer of no-code applications for manufacturing, raised a $120 million Series D led by . The 11-year-old Somerville, Massachusetts-based company was valued at $1.3 billion.
• �ѴDzԳٰ�é����-��������� , a manufacturing automation company utilizing modular robotics, raised a $90 million Series D led by . The 9-year-old company was valued at $1.2 billion.

Security

• , provider of security for cloud services in real time to protect from hackers, raised a $250 million Series B led by . The 3-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1.5 billion.
• Tel Aviv-based , an AI security platform that integrates with existing security platforms to provide context on incidents, raised a $140 million Series D led by . The 6-year-old company was valued at $1.2 billion.
• Belgium-based , a developer-oriented security platform, raised a $60 million Series B led by . The 3-year-old company was valued at $1 billion.

Semiconductor

• , an AI chip developer to run transformer models, raised a reported $500 million funding led by . The 3-year-old Cupertino, California-based company was valued at $5 billion.
• , an AI chip design company, raised a $300 million Series A led by . The less than 1-year-old Palo Alto, California-based company was valued at $4 billion.

Cryptocurrency

• Stablecoin payments platform raised a $250 million Series C led by . The 4-year-old New York-based company was valued at $2 billion.
• Crypto payments network raised a $75 million Series C led by . The 5-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1 billion.

Healthcare

• Maternity healthcare provider, raised a $92 million Series C led by Stripes. The 4-year-old New York-based company with plans to expand healthcare services to women and children was valued at $1.7 billion.
• , a co-ordination platform for medications across doctors, pharmacies and patients, raised a Series B led by . The 3-year-old New York-based company was valued at $1 billion.

Defense

• Paris-based , an autonomous drone maker, raised a $200 million Series B led by aircraft manufacturer . The 2-year-old company was valued at $1.4 billion.
• , a builder of secure software for the defense industry, raised a $136 million Series B led by . The 4-year-old Colorado-based company was valued at $1 billion.

Fintech

• Tokyo-based brokerage infrastructure provider raised a $150 million Series D led by . The 11-year-old company was valued at $1.2 billion.
• India-based , a payment infrastructure provider, raised a $50 million Series D led by . The 13-year-old company was valued at $1.2 billion.

Fitness

• , an owner of physical fitness brands and the parent of , raised a $785 million private equity financing led by . As part of the transaction it announced a merger with . The San Luis Obispo, California-based company was valued at $7.5 billion.

Autonomous Driving

• Toronto-based , a self-driving technology company, raised a $750 million Series C led by and ,valuing it at $3.8 billion. The 5-year-old company announced a partnership with to support robotaxis.

Social media

• , an AI-powered video generation platform for social media, raised an $80 million Series A extension funding which brings its Series A funding total to $130 million. The 3-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1.3 billion.

Education

• Online tutoring platform raised a $150 million Series D led by at a $1.2 billion valuation. The 14-year-old Brookline, Massachusetts-based company was founded by Ukrainians and maintains a team in Ukraine.

Compliance

• ESG compliance software platform raised a $100 million Series C led by , a joint venture between and . The 7-year-old Baden-Wurttemberg, Germany-based company was valued at $1.1 billion.

Energy

• , a developer of a residential energy storage device for electricity and electric vehicles, raised a $163 million funding. The 7-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1 billion.

Related Crunchbase unicorn lists:

• (1,684)
• (596)
• (37)
• (186)
• (115)
• (102)
• (868)
• (494)
• (226)
• (38)
• (470)

Related reading:

• High-Spending Investors Give 2026 An Active Start
• In The Era Of Unicorn Valuation Escalation, A Trillion Dollars Isn’t What It Used To Be
• Global VC Investment Surged In January, With U.S. Dominating Funding, But A Pair Of AI Model IPOs In China
• A Growing Share Of Seed And Series A Funding Is Going To Giant Rounds

Methodology

The Crunchbase ������Ƶ is a curated list that includes private unicorn companies with post-money valuations of $1 billion or more and is based on Crunchbase data. New companies are as they reach the $1 billion valuation mark as part of a funding round.

The unicorn board does not reflect internal company valuations — such as those set via a 409a process for employee stock options — as these differ from, and are more likely to be lower than, a priced funding round. We also do not adjust valuations based on investor writedowns, which change quarterly, as different investors will not value the same company consistently within the same quarter.

Funding to unicorn companies includes all private financings to companies that are tagged as unicorns, as well as those that have since graduated to .

Exits analyzed here only include the first time a company exits.

Please note that all funding values are given in U.S. dollars unless otherwise noted. Crunchbase converts foreign currencies to U.S. dollars at the prevailing spot rate from the date funding rounds, acquisitions, IPOs and other financial events are reported. Even if those events were added to Crunchbase long after the event was announced, foreign currency transactions are converted at the historic spot price.

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Today, it wouldn’t even be enough to buy one, if it was the newly combined and , now valuing itself at $1.25 trillion. It would also fall short for purchasing both of the next two — and — at post-money valuations they’re reportedly seeking.

So how much would it take to buy the top 100 at current valuations? About $3.5 trillion, according to an estimate from private share marketplace . 2

Call it the age of valuation escalation. Leading startups, traditionally known for their skill in growing businesses, are now demonstrating a similar mastery of scaling how much they’re worth.

It’s not exactly a new phenomenon, as top venture-backed companies have a long history of securing significant up rounds. What’s remarkable about the current era, of course, is the sheer size of the valuations.

The past couple months have offered a particularly fast-moving blur of  reported valuation gains we thought might warrant a summary.

To illustrate, we’re highlighting gains in two categories: companies valued at $100 billion-plus (the biggest unicorns)  and those valued at between $20 billion and $100 billion (the next-biggest unicorns). Both are seeing some big swings up and to the right.

The biggest unicorns

We’ll start with the biggest recent upward moves at the most highly valued U.S. companies, in order of valuation:

: SpaceX acquired ’s xAI last week in a that will reportedly value the combined company at $1.25 trillion. The deal comes in advance of an anticipated IPO later this year.

: The generative AI giant is reportedly in to raise $100 billion in fresh funding at a valuation of $750 billion or more. In October, the company at a $500 billion valuation.

: The Claude chatbot developer and OpenAI rival has reportedly at least $10 billion for a new financing at a $350 billion valuation this year, and is said to be likely to a total of more than $20 billion.

: The AI and data unicorn Monday that it has raised at a $134 billion valuation. The latest financing includes $5 billion in equity investment and $2 billion in debt funding. The company also said it crossed a $5.4 billion annual revenue run-rate.

: The autonomous driving company raised $16 billion in last week at a $126 billion post-money valuation.

: The payments platform a tender offer a year ago at a $91.5 billion valuation. It’s unclear what its most recent valuation would be, although market trends indicate it would likely be higher.

The next-biggest unicorns

: The blockchain and cryptocurrency company had a $40 billion valuation a in November.

: The developer of general-purpose humanoid robots a $39 billion post-money valuation for its last financing, a .

: The AI financing automation platform was at $32 billion in November, up from $22.5 billion just a few months earlier.

: The AI startup was at $32 billion as part of a in April.

: The defense tech unicorn secured at a $30.5 billion valuation in June.

: The AI processor developer picked up a round last week that  set a post-money valuation for the company of approximately $23 billion.

: The crypto exchange was reportedly around $20 billion after a funding round in November.

: The company known for its Cursor AI coding platform announced in November that it raised $2.3 billion in Series D funding at a $29.3 billion post-money valuation.

Gains are quite recent

Looking at the companies in both the biggest unicorns and next-biggest unicorns categories, what’s striking, in addition to the huge valuations, is how recently so many of these companies set or secured these high numbers.

Just over a year ago, SpaceX’s valuation hit $350 billion following a closely watched secondary share sale. That was considered quite high at the time.

And just 14 months ago, OpenAI’s valuation was . It was also considered quite high. Go figure.

What’s also noteworthy is that many of the next-biggest-unicorns secured their highest valuations to date in the last couple months of last year. That was prime-time for valuation escalation, perhaps in anticipation of an opening IPO window and growing investor consensus regarding early leaders in hot, emerging sectors.

Will these numbers hold up? Who knows. But one thing is clear: Anyone predicting a retraction for the “high” valuations attributed to leading unicorns a year or two ago has so far been mostly very wrong.

Related reading:

• The Crunchbase ������Ƶ
• Cursor’s $2.3B Financing Reminds Us: Coding Automation Is Still Ultra-Hot

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All told, global venture funding to financial technology startups totaled $51.8 billion for the year compared to $40.8 billion in 2024, per Crunchbase data. The investors who provided all that capital included a mix of private equity and alternative investors, with venture capital firms and accelerators next in line.

Interestingly, the most-active investor in the space by far all year, in terms of deal volume, was startup accelerator , which participated in 151 deals involving fintech startups last year. That’s up 24.8% compared to the 121 deals it wrote checks into in 2024.

The next most-active investor in 2025, , participated in nearly one-third as many deals, taking part in 51 rounds.

YC also topped the list of most-active investors in rounds of $5 million or above, participating in 64 such transactions. That’s up 146% compared to the 26 such deals that YC participated in during all of 2024, signaling a huge spike in interest on the accelerator’s part in the space. (We reached out to YC for comment, but didn’t hear back.)

Venture firm was next, writing checks into exactly half as many investments (32). Its pace was also up — by more than 50% — compared to 20 fintech deals over $5 million in 2024. A16z was also one of the most-active venture investors globally across all startup sectors last year, per Crunchbase data.

Other active fintech investors include other accelerators and the usual suspects, per Crunchbase data: , , , , , , and .

Leading $100M+ rounds

When it comes to leading or co-leading rounds of $100 million or more, , , , and topped the list, Crunchbase data shows.

Notably, many of the largest deals involved blockchain or crypto companies and prediction marketplaces.

• In October, trading prediction market raised $2 billion in a deal led by parent .
• In March, cryptocurrency exchange received a massive $2 billion investment from Abu Dhabi-based investment firm MGX.
• And in early December, New York-based announced it raised $1 billion in Series E funding at an $11 billion valuation. Crypto-focused investment firm Paradigm led the financing. That raise came shortly after the company raised a $300 million Series D co-led by a16z and Sequoia at a $5 billion valuation.
• Crypto exchange in November raised $800 million at a $20 billion valuation.

Post-seed lead investors

When it comes to leading or co-leading post-seed rounds, Sequoia Capital and Ribbit Capital tied for first place, with each firm doing so for a total of 11 fintech investments in 2025. That’s up from leading or co-leading six and five deals, respectively, in 2024.

QED Investors, a16z and Accel tied for third with 10 deals each. For QED, the pace was the same as in 2024, when it also led or co-led 10 post-seed fintech investments. However, it was a big jump for a16z, which had only led or co-led two post-seed fintech deals in 2024.

Related Crunchbase query:

Related reading:

• Fintech Funding Jumped 27% In 2025 With Fewer Deals But Bigger Checks
• Here Are The Fintech Companies That Could Go Public In 2025
• Crypto Giant Binance Scoops Up $2B From Abu Dhabi’s MGX
• Kalshi Secures $1B To Expand Predictions Market Platform

Illustration:

Total global funding to VC-backed financial technology startups totaled $51.8 billion for the year, per Crunchbase . That’s a fairly significant – 27% – increase from 2024’s total of $40.8 billion raised.

Unsurprisingly, the numbers are still much lower than the peak of $141.6 billion raised in 2021 and the $90.2 billion raised in 2022. But they are trending upward at least, unlike in 2024, when they fell below 2023 levels.

And, for the first time in recent years 2025 funding totals came in above pre-pandemic sums, which were $50.8 billion in 2020 and $49.3 billion in 2019.

Deal flow, however, was down — signaling fewer, but larger rounds. The year saw 3,457 deals consummated, a 23% decline from the more than 4,486 completed in 2024.

Table of contents

• Large deals
• ‘Chasing the AI-hype cycle’
• ‘Flight to quality’
• Methodology
• Glossary of funding terms

Large deals

The fact that the sector experienced an increase in funding despite a lower deal count indicates that the first half of 2025 saw a number of large rounds. Interestingly, several of the largest deals involved blockchain or crypto companies and prediction marketplaces.

• In October, trading prediction market raised $2 billion in a deal led by parent .
• In March, cryptocurrency exchange received a massive $2 billion investment from Abu Dhabi-based investment firm .
• And in early December,  New York-based announced it raised $1 billion in Series E funding at an $11 billion valuation. Crypto-focused investment firm led the financing.
• Crypto exchange in November raised $800 million at a $20 billion valuation.

Other sizeable deals that occurred during the year include U.K. payments platform ’s $500 million haul in mid-March; HR and payroll startup $450 million Series G in May; and expense management platform ’s $500 million Series E-2 at a $22.5 billion valuation in late July and $300 million raise at a $32 billion valuation in November.

‘Chasing the AI-hype cycle’

All the VCs we spoke with said they believe 2021 and 2022 were outlier periods for venture funding. The record funding during those years were driven by “the Covid-19 rebound and ultra-low interest rates,” said , managing director at , who is based in New York and focuses on investments in the firm’s financial services sector, including financial technology.

“After a reset, a more constructive overall market in 2025 has driven renewed investor appetite, albeit with investor selectivity around scale and quality in a world with continued uncertainty,” he wrote in an email interview.

VCs appear to be just fine with funding not returning to those elevated levels.

put it this way: 2021 and early 2022 were not healthy markets for the tech or startup industry as a whole. Fintech got a disproportionate amount of capital because of the COVID “everything is going digital” craze.

“Too much money was chasing too few great founders,” he said. “There would be four to five companies building the same thing, with business models that shouldn’t have been funded in the first place, and in many cases none of them were successful because none of them got to scale.”

‘Flight to quality’

Returning to the pace and exuberance of 2021, isn’t necessarily desirable or sustainable, according to ���ձ� , who believes fintech is seeing a continued flight to quality with capital increasingly concentrating on companies with differentiated ideas, clear execution and “bona fide traction.”

Meanwhile, it has become meaningfully harder for others to raise.

“That dynamic helps explain why total funding dollars are up even as deal volume is down,” he told Crunchbase News. “I think the level of activity we saw in 2025 is healthy. At the earliest stages … the pipeline remains very strong, particularly across AI and stablecoins. Those areas have real structural tailwinds.”

Methodology

The data contained in this report comes directly from Crunchbase, and is based on reported data. Data is as of Jan. 4, 2026.

Note that data lags are most pronounced at the earliest stages of venture activity, with seed funding amounts increasing significantly after the end of a quarter/year.

Please note that all funding values are given in U.S. dollars unless otherwise noted.

Crunchbase converts foreign currencies to U.S. dollars at the prevailing spot rate from the date funding rounds, acquisitions, IPOs and other financial events are reported. Even if those events were added to Crunchbase long after the event was announced, foreign currency transactions are converted at the historic spot price.

Glossary of funding terms

Seed and angel consists of seed, pre-seed and angel rounds. Crunchbase also includes venture rounds of unknown series, equity crowdfunding and convertible notes at $3 million (USD or as-converted USD equivalent) or less.

Early-stage consists of Series A and Series B rounds, as well as other round types. Crunchbase includes venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $3 million, and those less than or equal to $15 million.

Late-stage consists of Series C, Series D, Series E and later-lettered venture rounds following the “Series [Letter]” naming convention. Also included are venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $15 million. Corporate rounds are only included if a company has raised an equity funding at seed through a venture series funding round.

Technology growth is a private-equity round raised by a company that has previously raised a “venture” round. (So basically, any round from the previously defined stages.)

Related Crunchbase query:

Related reading:

• Here Are The Fintech Companies That Could Go Public In 2025
• Crypto Giant Binance Scoops Up $2B From Abu Dhabi’s MGX
• Kalshi Secures $1B To Expand Predictions Market Platform

Illustration:

Notably, the financing comes less than five months after New York-based Rain announced a round and 10 months after its . With the latest round, Rain has now raised over $338 million in funding. , , , , , , �����Ի� also participated in the Series C raise.

Rain also connects digital money to everyday payments, allowing businesses to convert ordinary currency into stablecoins and use them to pay vendors, employees or customers.

It also acts like a bridge between blockchain-based currency and traditional payment systems to do things like make cross-border payments easier.

In a statement, CEO and co-founder said that Rain’s active card base increased 30x over the past year, while its annualized payment volume surged by 38x. Overall, the company’s technology facilitates more than $3 billion in annualized transactions for over 200 companies, including , and .

The new capital will allow Rain to expand into new markets and grow its enterprise customer base, according to Malik.

“Stablecoins are quickly becoming the way money moves in the 21st century, but adoption by users worldwide requires cards and apps that just work,” he said.

Iconiq partner said in a statement that his firm believes there is a shift underway from legacy payment networks to programmable digital-asset infrastructure.

“… And there is a brief window to help define the default platform enterprises will rely on,” he added, noting that Rain’s focus on making tokenized money mainstream, rather than “a niche financial experiment, may resonate and align with what large enterprises are looking for as they move from exploration to production.” 

Global venture funding to financial technology startups in 2025 reached $51.9 billion across 3,733 deals, per Crunchbase . That’s a 26.9% increase in dollars raised compared to the $40.9 billion raised across 4,813 deals in 2024.

Related Crunchbase query:

Related reading:

• Fintech Comeback? IPOs Reignite Investor Optimism, But VC Funding Still Trails 2021 Highs
• Here Are The Fintech Companies That Could Go Public In 2025
• Ripple Lands $500M At $40B Valuation As Crypto’s Good Year Continues

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It’s what reporters like to see. Finally, a chance to peek under the hood of the buzziest unicorns to see their revenue, growth rates and largest shareholder stakes. And while most of those companies lose money, an IPO filing provides a glimpse of gross margins and a sense of when a company might reach profitability.

All this is to say that the mere possibility of a public offering — as was teased for in a late Tuesday — is an exciting development for those of us lamenting the paucity of unicorn IPOs in recent months.

Of course, no company goes public just to satiate the curiosity of that negligible portion of the population that lives for S-1 filings. The primary reasons are far more pragmatic: To raise money, benefit from a higher profile and potential valuation boost that comes with a public listing, and  offer a path to liquidity for founders, employees and early investors.

The draws are big enough that it behooves the most high-profile private companies to have preparations in place for a public listing, even if they do end up delaying or scrapping it. In a similar vein, a few weeks ago that is laying the groundwork for a potential IPO of its own.

The valuations are enormous

The valuations the generative AI giants are seeking would sound fantastical were they not backed up by both private markets and ever-climbing stocks of already public AI behemoths.

OpenAI is reportedly eyeing an initial public valuation of up to $1 trillion — double its last reported private valuation of in a secondary share sale last month. It is reportedly eyeing a public filing as early as the second half of 2026.

Anthropic is currently said to be pursuing fresh funding at a private valuation of more than $300 billion. So, it would presumably seek an even higher market cap in a public offering, although it’s yet unclear how high.

I won’t opine on what valuations seem sensible for these iconic yet still deeply unprofitable companies. However, for context, it’s worth pointing out that no American venture-backed company that’s ever gone public has notched an initial valuation even close to these levels.

, which went public on as Facebook in 2012, is still the record-holder, per Crunchbase data. It went public at an initial valuation of $104 billion — barely over one-tenth what OpenAI is said to be seeking.

Next on this list is , at $86 billion, followed by at $82.4 billion. Only six VC-funded companies have debuted at $40 billion or more, per Crunchbase, listed below.

Significantly, these numbers reflect the valuations at which companies priced shares, not how much they were worth in first-day trading. When went public this summer, for instance, shares more than tripled in first-day trading, which took it to well over the $40 billion mark even though it priced below that.

Could 2026 finally be the IPO year?

If public investors are ready and willing to buy into OpenAI at its talked-about valuation, it sounds like an effort worth undertaking for the company. Ditto for Anthropic, particularly if it manages to get to market first, thus diminishing some of the spotlight perpetually shined on its rival.

Ever since the startup IPO boom period of 2020-2022 came to a conclusion, market watchers keep trying to predict when we’ll see another. Hopes that 2025 would be the year are now fading. Although we’ve seen a few big, well-received startup IPOs, activity has remained muted.

Maybe 2026 will be the year. Record-setting offerings from the biggest GenAI names certainly wouldn’t hurt in turning up the volume.

Related Crunchbase queries:

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• The MVPs Of The Startup World Are Still Getting More Valuable
• The Crunchbase ������Ƶ

Illustration: