As the first crypto firm co-founded by Sam Bankman-Fried (“SBF”) after leaving Wall Street in late 2017, Alameda Research is now positioned not only as a crypto quantitative trading firm, but also as a participant in numerous blockchain projects and startups, helping to expand the entire Alameda Research/ FTX The Alameda Research/FTX Group continues to expand its footprint.
At its inception, Alameda Research had approximately $100 million under management and could earn up to tens of millions of dollars per day through arbitrage operations in the Bitcoin market, including cross-zone.
And after the creation of FTX by SBF in 2019, Alameda Research began to position itself as a proprietary quantitative trading firm for FTX, aiming to provide liquidity to the crypto market, as well as being the launch team behind FTX and Serum.
Currently, Alameda Research plays a “think tank” role in the entire ecosystem, with its business lines being trading (quantitative trading + market maker), OTC, research and analysis, and investment.
Read about Alameda Research’s investment map: public chains, DeFi, NFT, and more
Alameda Research’s investment map
By incomplete statistics, Alameda Research’s investments in the crypto sector cover public chains and ecological funds, CeFi, DeFi, data analysis and development tools, NFT and metaverse, GameFi, etc., with a total of over 160 projects.
Alameda Research is not only interested in regional exchanges, crypto custodians and brokers, trading and liquidity protocols, but also continues to invest intensively in projects across the Solana track as the SBF begins to develop the Solana ecosystem in 2020.
Public Chain and Ecology (Layer1 & Layer2)
Solana is a high-performance underlying public chain, first developed in 2017, dedicated to improving public chain scalability while ensuring decentralization and security.
Solana Labs aims to accelerate the development of projects on the Solana blockchain and establish a venture capital arm for the Solana ecosystem.
Fantom is a Layer1 network based on the aBFT consensus protocol and aims to build a highly scalable blockchain ecosystem to promote decentralized, scalable and secure technologies.
NEAR Protocol closed a new $150 million round of funding in January with participation from Alameda Research.
Secret Network announced on January 19 a new $225 million ecosystem fund and a $175 million gas pedal pool with funding from DeFiance Capital, Alameda Research, CoinFund and HashKey.
Polygon announced on February 8 that it completed a $450 million funding round through the sale of MATIC tokens, with participation from Alameda Research.
South Korean blockchain platform Klaytn Foundation announced on April 21 that Alameda Research has joined the Klaytn blockchain ecosystem as a strategic partner and investor.
Arbitrum is an Ethernet Layer 2 scaling solution based on Optimistic Rollup.
StarkWare, a zero-knowledge proof technology development company, has launched StarkNet, an Ethernet Layer 2 scaling network based on ZK Rollup on the main Ethernet network.
CeFi
Exchange
VALR is a South African cryptocurrency exchange that closed a $50 million Series B funding round in March at a $240 million valuation and plans to continue expanding in other markets such as Africa and India, as well as joining traditional financial institutions such as large banks, insurance companies and hedge funds to help build the exchange’s infrastructure.
MARA, an African crypto exchange, plans to launch its Layer1 public chain powered by its native MARA token and will launch its beta network in Q4.
Pintu, an Indonesian cryptocurrency exchange focused on simplifying the trading experience for beginners, is registered as a licensed crypto broker under the Indonesian Commodity Futures Trading Regulatory Agency.
BitOasis is a cryptocurrency exchange in the Middle East and North Africa.
AscendEx Exchange, founded in 2018 as BitMax, is a digital asset finance platform founded by a group of Wall Street quantitative trading veterans.
CoinMENA is a Bahrain-based cryptocurrency exchange launched in early 2021 by Dina Saman, Talal Tabbaa, and Yazan Barghuthi, and is a fully regulated domestic cryptocurrency exchange authorized by the Central Bank of Bahrain, offering services such as fiat to cryptocurrency, cryptocurrency purchases, and trading.
CryptoLocally is an African crypto exchange that supports users to simply buy and sell cryptocurrencies in their native currency.
UpBots is a trading ecosystem solution that combines DEX and CEX to form a trading system and integrates various DeFi protocols that support collateral, lending, and seamlessly switches between robo-trading and manual trading.
Cryptocurrencies.AI (Aldrin) uses a hybrid centralized + decentralized model that leverages centralized exchange integration to provide additional liquidity and user experience for traders.
Capital Management & Funds
SEBA is an institution-focused Swiss crypto bank offering custody, trading, lending and investment management services, and is also exploring lending and custody services for the NFT market and the DeFi market.
Voyager Digital is a crypto asset broker with over $225 million in liquidity, including approximately $175 million in cash and another $50 million in cryptocurrencies.
Pangea Fund is a crypto hedge fund founded by Ryan Watkins, a former analyst at Messari, and Daniel Cheung, formerly of Jennison Associates LLC, that will focus solely on a “long-only” strategy, building long positions in three to seven issued tokens.
Paradigm is an institutional liquidity network for derivatives traders in the CeFi and DeFi space that allows users to customize trade layouts, provides a modular interactive interface, and multiple instruments to trade side-by-side. The project is based on protocol-built trading, providing a front-end interface and order matching engine that allows exchanges and traders to access a single global liquidity pool and abstract proprietary liquidity models. At the same time, Paradigm provides developers with a platform to implement settlement logic, financial tools to support spot and derivatives trading and lending, offline order relay with on-chain settlement, and allocates fees to developers proportional to contract usage.
Efficient Frontier is a cryptocurrency market maker that conducts hundreds of thousands of transactions and hundreds of millions of dollars per day through its system, aiming to build the world’s most powerful autonomous trading system for digital assets.
Folkvang is a crypto high-frequency quantitative trading firm that relies on computers and algorithm-based trading strategies.
Archax is a regulated UK crypto asset firm and the first crypto asset firm to be registered with the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) in the UK.
Satori Research is a digital asset trading and advisory firm founded in 2020 that offers fund management, market making, and research and advisory services including specializing in market neutral quantitative strategies.
OVEX is a South African cryptocurrency broker with products including OTC desks and electronic request for quotations (instant buy and sell), and crypto interest accounts.
Anchorage is a cryptocurrency custodian and the first cryptocurrency company to be approved by the U.S. national banking regulator.
Oxygen is a Swiss DeFi bulk brokerage company that aims to build an ecosystem linking DeFi tools to a registered user base of over 100 million.
DeFi
Trading & Liquidity
Serum is a decentralized exchange built on Solana that aims to be a full-fledged decentralized trading infrastructure.
1inch is an on-chain aggregated trading protocol that aggregates Uniswap, Uniswap2, Kyber, Curve, Oasis, 0x, dForce Swap and other trading protocols to help route almost all DeFi transactions, and by integrating with various DEX service providers, 1inch users are able to achieve lower transaction costs and transaction latency.
Zebec Protocol is the Solana ecosystem’s programmable cash flow protocol that supports sending funds in real-time and continuous payments for payroll, investment, and other scenarios, providing people with the freedom to access and use their payroll immediately without relying on intermediaries that currently profit from delayed transactions.
Ref Finance is the AMM and stablecoin exchange marketplace for the NEAR ecosystem, designed to provide a DeFi one-stop shop for the NEAR ecosystem, and will work on centralizing liquidity capabilities in the second half of 2022 with the launch of Zap Swap functionality, allowing anyone to access any LP token in a single operation.
Sommelier is a liquidity management protocol for Uniswap V3 that uses a Cosmos-based network of validators to manage positions.
Saddle Finance is an automated market maker tool designed for crypto assets with anchored prices.
pSTAKE Finance is a liquidity pledge product under the Cosmos-based interoperability protocol Persistence, where PoS token holders can deposit their tokens on the pSTAKE app to mint 1:1 linked ERC-20 packaged unpledged tokens pTOKEN (e.g. pATOM), pTOKEN can be transferred to other wallets or smart contracts on the ethereum network to generate additional revenue.
Zenlink is based on Polkadot’s underlying cross-chain DEX protocol and aims to be the hub of Polkadot’s DEX portfolio. By accessing the Zenlink DEX Protocol, an open and universal cross-chain DEX protocol built on Substrate, it enables all parallel chains to build DEX and share liquidity with one click.
Bonfida is a decentralized trading platform built on Solana and its decentralized exchange Serum, positioned as the “front-end interface” to Serum, with transactions routed to Serum for shared depth.
Slope Finance is a DEX built for the community, based on Solana to provide community users with a fast, near zero-fee and ultimate mobile trading experience. Its Slope Wallet is the first cross-device wallet developed for the Solana ecosystem and is now available in the App Store, Google Play and Chrome extensions, and Slope DEX is the first Serum and Solana mobile-based DEX.
DODO is a decentralized exchange with an active market making algorithm (PMM).
RAMP DEFI is a cross-chain liquidity unlocking solution that allows non-ERC-20 token holders to pledge digital assets and use them effectively (Farming and lending).
Sifchain is a full-chain decentralized exchange built on the Cosmos SDK that enables compatibility with Ether on the Cosmos network, bringing liquidity on Ether to other Cosmos projects such as Sifchain, Kava, Akash, etc.
3Commas is an intelligent trading terminal and automated trading bot that provides retail traders with the ability to build automated bots to trade cryptocurrencies across multiple trading venues.
ParaSwap is a DEX aggregator that provides DeFi traders and DApps with the best DEX prices.
Nerve Finance is an automated market maker (AMM) designed to trade stablecoins and anchored assets on BNB Chain.
Impossible Finance is a DeFi incubator on BNB Chain designed to support the launch of new DeFi projects through its own AMM liquidity protocol by building a multi-chain ecosystem.
Balancer is a decentralized transaction protocol based on a pool of funds exchange, which allows anyone to provide liquidity to an existing Balancer pool or create a liquidity pool of their own, in addition to each Balancer pool being a self-balancing index fund.
Revenue & Management
On May 24 Katana has launched Katana Treasury, a DAO revenue management tool built specifically for DAOs as a solution for revenue generation, risk management and analytics that can be tailored to the specific funding needs preferences of DAOs. Delta One
Founded by brothers Paul and DJ Sengh during the Solana Ignition Hackathon in October 2021, Delta One is designed to provide users with an automated, low-risk way to earn income by investing in a basket of crypto options.
Solrise Finance is a Solana-based fund management and investment protocol that supports users in allocating funds among managed funds, participating in DeFi and reducing transaction costs, as well as allowing users to create their own funds.
Symmetry is a decentralized index protocol and portfolio management platform based on Solana that allows users to create their own indexes through Symmetry, as well as purchase indexes created by others.
Prysm is a social investment platform focused on cryptocurrencies, DeFi, and NFT that enables users to follow the best investors and create profiles and set the types of investments of interest.
Tulip Protocol (formerly SolFarm) is a Solana eco-income aggregator that currently offers 3 income products: Vaults, Lending, and Leveraged Farming.
APY.Finance is a DeFi liquidity mining aggregator that allows users to earn income in a “risk/reward optimal way” through various DeFi products.
Stacked is a retail-friendly crypto passive investment tool that allows users to invest money directly in ready-made strategies and automate buying, selling and position management from head hedge funds and traders, while the actual trading takes place with Stacked partners (Coinbase, FTX, Coinan, etc.).
Lending & Derivatives
Aurigami is the Aurora ecosystem’s decentralized lending marketplace that enables idle assets on Aurora to be turned into interest-bearing auTokens and leveraged through collateralized lending to deploy borrowed funds elsewhere for additional revenue, enabling users to lend and borrow digital assets as well as earn interest.
zkLend is an L2 money market protocol built on StarkNet and offers two solutions, a compliance-centric solution for institutional clients and a license-free service for DeFi users. zkLend is not yet live and co-founder Brian Fu has 15 years of experience working for Bloomberg, Standard Chartered Bank, and others.
Jet Protocol is a Solana eco-lending protocol focused on innovative loan products and cross-chain interest rate arbitrage.
Parallel Finance is a decentralized money marketplace that provides lending and pledging products and brings more liquidity to the Polkadot ecosystem. Depositors can simultaneously lend and pledge funds, earning double interest, and borrowers can pledge to borrow.
Ratio Finance, incubated by Rarestone Capital, allows users to mint stablecoins (USDr) by pledging assets to extend their liquidity provisioning capabilities.
PsyOptions is a physically delivered American-style options protocol that makes no assumptions about options trading and pricing and supports any of Solana’s SPL assets, whether tokens, NFTs, or tokenized stocks, having previously won a hackathon event in partnership with Solana and Serum.
Drift Protocol is Solana’s eco perpetual futures trading platform with two main features: a hybrid margin, which allows users to open positions with assets held in their accounts as margin without converting to stablecoin; and a dynamic automated market maker, which provides higher liquidity, reduces slippage and gives users access to market orders.
Solend is a Solana eco-lending protocol that allows users to pledge assets on Solana to obtain loans.
Arrow Markets is an Avalanche-based AMM options protocol that creates and settles decentralized options contracts through AMM, removing all the middlemen from the broker to the clearing house in the traditional options trading process and transferring the cost savings to the system users, aiming to democratize the returns of traditional options market makers.
Perpetual Protocol is a decentralized derivatives trading protocol that just released a governance proposal earlier this month to allocate 9 million OPs to drive its growth on the Optimism network, specifically to incentivize lenders to lend to market makers, liquidity mining, and to incentivize the use of Perp as a base layer to build applications.
01 Exchange is a Solana-based derivatives trading platform that focuses on “perpetual contracts” and “multiplier perpetuals” (Power Perpetuals) and is capable of supporting hundreds of coins for trading and dozens of different coins for margin, supporting cross-chain deposits; in addition, through integration with Serum, 01 Exchange users can use the order book In addition, through integration with Serum, 01 Exchange users can use the order book to make transactions and get the same interactive experience as the centralized platform.
Linear Finance is a cross-chain compatible (Ether and BNB Chain) decentralized synthetic asset protocol that allows users to access synthetic capabilities for a variety of assets, including digital assets, commodities and market indices.
Cega is a Solana-based DeFi derivatives protocol founded by former UBS derivatives trader Arisa Toyosaki, which creates exotic derivative contracts for retail investors as well as pledged products for consumers. options and a call option with knock-in and knock-out barriers.
Float Capital is a synthetic asset protocol based on Polygon and Avalanche that allows users to mint tokenized long or short leveraged positions with no liquidation and no overcollateralization and no transaction fees.
dTrade (renamed Firefly Exchange) is a Boca-based derivatives platform that enables leveraged derivatives trading by supporting on-chain clearing with no custody or counterparty risk.
Persistence aims to support institutional open financing by tokenizing real-world assets through NFT and using them as collateral to facilitate lending of crypto assets (e.g. stablecoins), the goal of the project is to connect DeFi to traditional finance and use DeFi’s functionality to solve real-world financing problems.
Opium is a universal and comprehensive on-chain derivatives protocol that allows users to create, clear and trade any decentralized derivatives.
Hedget is a decentralized options trading protocol started by the blockchain project Chromia , which allows investors to create and trade different options products on the chain and can hedge against price fluctuations as well as risks associated with mortgage positions.
MCDEX is a decentralized perpetual contract trading platform that is currently live on the BNB Chain and Abritrum networks.
Horizon Finance is an interest rate trading platform designed to allow all decentralized finance participants to manage their APY and interest rate exposures and to advance the industry by building a key component of the decentralized financial system.
Port Finance is a Solana eco-lending protocol that provides users with competitive loans and interest rate derivatives that allow users to use bar positions.
Alchemix is a DeFi protocol that helps users access future returns on deposits in a synthetic asset token model, allowing users to retrieve a portion of their deposits in temporarily pledged stablecoins.
Wallets & Infrastructure
Strata Protocol is a Solana eco-token issuance and management protocol created by software developer Noah Prince with the goal of making it easier for developers to issue tokens on Solana. It provides a code-free solution for users to issue and sell tokens, as well as to offer tokens in exchange for donations.
Liquality is an unmanaged multi-chain wallet with built-in Atomic Swap functionality, incubated by ConsenSys, the ethereum technology development company that incubated MetaMask, and currently supports Bitcoin, Ether, Rootstock, NEAR, and Polygon.
XDEFI is a multi-chain wallet with built-in DEX and cross-chain aggregators, currently supporting network assets such as Ether, Polygon, BNB Chain, THORChain, Bitcoin, Litecoin, and Bitcoin Cash.
