The Daily: VCs invest over $400 million in Toncoin, Kraken's largest-ever crypto-tradfi deal and more

The following article is adapted from The Block’s newsletter,  The Daily , which comes out on weekday afternoons.

Happy Thursday! The U.S. President addressed the Digital Asset Summit in New York earlier today. However, unsurprisingly, the hyped-up speech was, in reality, much ado about nothing, with Trump reiterating the same well-worn, existing crypto proposals and aspirations in a pre-recorded message as bitcoin retraced most of Wednesday's gains. 

In today's newsletter, VCs including Sequoia Capital, Ribbit, Benchmark and Kingsway invest over $400 million in Toncoin, Kraken agrees to the largest-ever crypto and tradfi deal, Trump Media execs launch a SPAC eyeing U.S.-based crypto firms and more.

Meanwhile, Bernstein cuts its price targets for Bitcoin miners amid significant underperformance relative to BTC in 2025. Plus, Canary Capital files for the first-ever Pengu ETF tracking the PENGU token and Pudgy Penguins NFT collection.

Let's get started.

VCs buy over $400 million of Toncoin

TON Foundation announced that venture capital firms such as Sequoia Capital, Ribbit, Benchmark and Kingsway have invested over $400 million in Toncoin .

• Other investors included Vy Capital, Draper Associates and Libertus Capital, alongside CoinFund, Hypersphere, SkyBridge and Karatage.
• Toncoin is the native cryptocurrency of TON blockchain, powering a growing number of mini-app games on Telegram, among other use cases.
• "Essentially, these VCs are placing their bets on the future success and utility of TON blockchain, its growing ecosystem and its potential to provide real-world utility for crypto holdings, especially within Telegram," a TON Foundation spokesperson said.
• Venture capital firms interested in TON blockchain, in large part due to its strong connection to the Telegram messaging app, which now boasts 1 billion users, also include Pantera Capital, which made two separate Toncoin investments last year, and Animoca Brands.
• In the past year, TON blockchain surpassed over 40 million active users, with 121 million unique Toncoin holders, the foundation claimed.
• Despite more than halving from its mid-2024 all-time high, Toncoin remains a top 20 cryptocurrency with a market cap of over $9 billion.

Kraken's $1.5 billion largest-ever crypto and tradfi deal

Crypto exchange Kraken has agreed to acquire CFTC-registered U.S. retail futures trading platform NinjaTrader for $1.5 billion — marking the largest-ever deal between crypto and traditional finance .

• The deal is designed to accelerate Kraken's multi-asset-class ambitions — including plans for equities trading and payments, the firm noted in a Thursday blog post.
• "This transaction is the first step in our vision of an institutional-grade trading platform where any asset can be traded, anytime," Kraken co-CEO Arjun Sethi said.
• The acquisition is expected to close in the first half of this year, subject to certain purchase price adjustments, with Kraken gaining access to U.S. crypto futures and derivatives while also facilitating NinjaTrader's expansion into the U.K., EU and Australia.

Trump Media execs launch SPAC eyeing US-based crypto firms

A special purpose acquisition company (SPAC), managed by executives closely linked to Trump Media & Technology Group, aims to raise $179 million to purchase a U.S. crypto or blockchain company .

• Renatus Tactical Acquisition Corp I, a blank-check company incorporated in the Cayman Islands, plans to complete a business combination through an initial public offering and private placement.
• The SPAC's management team includes key Trump Media figures, such as Eric Swider, Devin Nunes and Alexander Cano.
• The company cited the Trump administration's efforts to integrate digital assets into its national financial strategy, including the creation of a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve, as motivation for the move.

MoonPay lands $200 million credit line from Galaxy to handle memecoin frenzies

Crypto onramp MoonPay has secured a $200 million revolving credit line from investment firm Galaxy to manage extreme liquidity demands.

• When Donald Trump launched his official memecoin in January, the unprecedented frenzy of demand outside traditional banking hours meant MoonPay had to scramble for $160 million, with Galaxy and XRP-focused company Ripple stepping in to help.
• The credit line aims to help MoonPay be more prepared should a similar event happen again and better handle out-of-hours spikes in transaction volume and liquidity requirements in the short term.
• MoonPay co-founder and CEO Ivan Soto-Wright declined to disclose the terms of the credit line but said the company is "pleased" with the agreement, emphasizing it is not intended to assume long-term debt.

Bybit hacker starting to use bitcoin mixers

Bybit CEO Ben Zhou reported on Thursday that 86% of the $1.5 billion stolen in the crypto exchange's February hack, about 440,091 ETH, has now been converted into 12,836 BTC and distributed across 9,117 wallets.

• The hacker, believed to be the North Korean Lazarus Group, has started to use bitcoin mixers like CryptoMixer, Tornado Cash, Railgun and Wasabi to launder the stolen crypto before funneling the funds to various peer-to-peer vendors.
• Despite efforts to track the assets, 7.6% of the stolen crypto has become untraceable, with 88.8% still traceable and 3.5% successfully frozen, Zhou said.

In the next 24 hours

• It's quiet on the economic calendar front.
• U.S. FOMC member John Williams will speak at 9:05 a.m. ET on Friday.
• Immutable, Moca Network and Morpho are set for token unlocks.

Never miss a beat with The Block's  daily digest  of the most influential events happening across the digital asset ecosystem.