Digital Currency Group is fundraising again, this time completing a debt capital raise that provided a credit facility of up to $600 million.

The venture capital firm owns some of the biggest players in cryptocurrency, including Grayscale Investments, a large digital asset manager with about $55 billion in assets under management; Foundry, a financing and advisory company focused on digital asset mining and staking; and Luno, a digital asset exchange and wallet operating in major and emerging markets. Grayscale Investments has filed to turn its Grayscale Bitcoin Trust into an exchange-traded fund, a fund that trades on a stock exchange.

The credit facility is the organization’s first entry into debt capital markets and comes just two weeks after the conglomerate reached a $10 billion valuation after a $700 million secondary sale. Eldridge led the credit facility, which included institutional lenders and funds managed by Capital Group, Davidson Kempner Capital Management and Francisco Partners, among others.

“This financing strengthens our ability to respond dynamically to opportunities in the market,” the group’s founder and CEO Barry Silbert said Thursday in announcing the credit facility.

Neobank Upgrade raises $280M

Fintech startup Upgrade revealed a $280 million series F funding round Tuesday. The company’s pre-money valuation sits at $6 billion.

The round was led by Coatue Management and DST Global. Dragoneer Investment Group and existing investors including Gopher Asset Management, G Squared, Koch Disruptive Technologies, Old Well Partners, Ribbit Capital, Sands Capital, Ventura Capital and Vy Capital.

The neobank offers a buy now, pay later (BNPL) credit card called Upgrade Card, which turns every purchase into an installment plan. Unlike other BNPL fintechs, however, “Upgrade Card is accepted wherever Visa is accepted,” CEO and co-founder Renaud Laplanche told Bank Automation News in August.

Laplanche also said at the time that he believed the company would be ready to go public in the next 18 months.

“We’ve recorded unprecedented growth — over 200% this year — while staying profitable, which is a rare combination. Investors also really like our product strategy centered around Upgrade Card,” Laplanche told BAN.

The San Francisco-based Upgrade was recognized as the fastest-growing company in the Americas by the Financial Times earlier this year, and Upgrade Card was recently recognized by Nilson Report as the fastest-growing credit card in America, marking the first time a fintech company has appeared among the top 50 US credit card issuers, the company said in a release.

CloudWalk hits $2.15B valuation

CloudWalk, a Sao Paulo-based payment technology network announced Wednesday that it raised $150 million in series C funding, bringing the company’s total capital raised to $365 million and its valuation to $2.15 billion.

The round was led by Coatue with participation from DST Global, A-Star, The Hive Brazil, Plug and Play Ventures, Valor Capital Group, angel investor Gokul Rajaram, and NFL players Larry Fitzgerald and Kelvin Beachum.

The funds will be used to improve CloudWalk’s blockchain technology, build out the company’s technology team and fuel international expansion, the company stated.

CloudWalk leverages blockchain and machine learning in its core processing stack to offer a payment ecosystem for small and medium business merchants and their customers. It has seen a growth of more than 5,000% in the past 24 months, according to a company spokesperson. It processes more than $2.4 billion in transactions annually and has a presence in 4,300 cities in Brazil. This year, it launched an e-commerce platform, a digital wallet and a stablecoin, the Brazilian Digital Real.

“As the global payments market rapidly evolves, we believe that blockchain will soon become the dominant source for all future payment processes,” Luis Silva, CloudWalk founder and CEO, stated in the funding announcement.

Justt emerges from stealth mode with $70 million in funding

Justt emerged from stealth this week with the news it raised $50 million in series B funding, bringing its total funding raised to $70 million.

The Tel Aviv-based startup, founded in Feb. 2020 by Roenen Ben-Ami and Ofir Tahor, automates chargeback disputes on behalf of online merchants. Justt’s funding round was led Greenwich, Conn.-based Oak HC/FT, building upon a $15 million raise led by Zeev Ventures in February and a $5 million raise led by F2 Venture Capital in November 2020. Strategic individual investors in Justt include David Marcus, former PayPal president; Jacqueline Reses, former head of Square Capital; and Gokul Rajaram, a DoorDash executive.

Tower Federal Credit Union deploys Scienaptic’s platform

The $4 billion Tower Federal Credit Union this week joined the growing list of credit unions that are leveraging artificial intelligence through Scienaptic IA’s credit-decisioning platform. The implementation will allow the Laurel, Md.-based credit union to make faster credit decisions, according to Wednesday’s announcement.

Other credit unions that have deployed Scienaptic include the $3 billion Spokane Valley, Wash.-based Numerica Credit Union, $4.4 billion Richland, Wash.-based Gesa Credit Union, $2.1 million Denver-based Credit Union of Colorado and $125.8 million Sturgis, S.D.-based Northern Hills Federal Credit Union.