Stader Labs announce $12.5 million strategic raise, receives praise from Terra founder Do Kwon

On Thursday, Stader Labs, a crypto firm building decentralized finance, or DeFi, products for proof-of-stake blockchain networks, announced that it raised $12.5 million in a private sale. The funding round was led by Three Arrows Capital with additional participation from Blockchain.com, Accomplice, DACM, GoldenTree Asset Management, Accel, Amber, 4RC, Figment, and anger investors. This puts Staber Labs at a valuation of $450 million.

Amitej Gajjala, CEO of Stader Labs, issued the following comment regarding the development:

This capital will be strategically deployed to accelerate our cross-chain expansion, as well as to nurture our growing ecosystem of third-parties developing staking applications with decentralized Stader infrastructure.

Stader Labs' two core products are Stake Pools and Liquid Staking. Stake Pools enable retail and institutional investors to earn staking rewards in pre-defined baskets of validators grouped by performance. Meanwhile, Liquid Staking allows users to receive liquid tokens (LunaX) when staking, which can then be deposited into other DeFi protocols to farm yields. It's a derivative of the original token that can potentially lead to compounded rewards, as well as compounded risks.

According to Kyle Davies, co-founder of Three Arrows Capital, there are now over 15,000 unique wallets staking on Stader Labs, with total value locked of around $500 million. Its protocols launched last November.

Currently, Stader Labs only support staking on the Terra (LUNA) blockchain but has plans to expand to Solana (SOL), Ethereum (ETH), Fantom, Hedera, and Polygon (MATIC). Do Kwon, founder, and CEO of Terra, commented:

These tools will bring Stader closer to its vision to be the most convenient and safe non-custodial staking platform — and a core ally in the future of finance thanks to its embedded decentralization for layer-one solutions.