Crypto Gold Rush: $322M for Stablecoins, AI, and Modular Infra!

The New Digital Gold Rush: Stablecoins, AI, and Modular Infrastructure Draw $322 Million in Crypto Ventures

2025-10-09 - A substantial capital infusion of $322 million across 26 projects this past week signals a pronounced investor focus on programmable money, artificial intelligence (AI) tooling within the crypto sphere, and modular infrastructure designed for scalability. These domains are quickly consolidating their role as central to the evolution of the digital asset landscape, drawing sizable backing from leading venture capital firms and established crypto entities.

New ventures in stablecoin infrastructure, decentralized compute, and real-world asset (RWA) protocols dominated the investment landscape from July 28 to August 1, 2025. This pattern aligns with broader currents in the financial industry, where tokenized cash and AI-driven solutions are increasingly seen as foundational for next-generation payment systems and digital economies.

Stablecoins and the Future of Payments

The biggest single investment, $40 million, went to RD Technologies, a stablecoin infrastructure provider responsible for HKDR, a Hong Kong dollar-backed stablecoin. This underscores growing confidence in national-currency-backed digital assets. Likewise, Stable, a new Layer 1 blockchain built specifically for stablecoins and using USDT for gas fees, secured $28 million from investors including Bitfinex and Hack VC. These financings highlight the industry's push to strengthen the underlying rails for digital currencies.

This surge in stablecoin-related funding mirrors a broader assessment by McKinsey & Company in its July 21, 2025 report, "The stable door opens: How tokenized cash enables next-gen payments." The paper argues that "2025 may witness a material shift across the payments industry" because of the spread of tokenized cash. Stablecoins, defined as digital cash issued on a blockchain and pegged to fiat currency, are identified as a global alternative to traditional payment infrastructure.

Even though their current transaction volume represents under 1 percent of global money flows, stablecoins are noted for their potential to deliver sizable gains in speed, cost, transparency, and accessibility versus legacy payment networks such as Swift or Fedwire. McKinsey projects that if the present growth trajectory persists, stablecoin transactions "could surpass legacy payment volumes in less than a decade." The report stresses that regulatory clarity-like the US Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins (GENIUS) Act of 2025, which passed the Senate in June-is crucial for broad adoption.

Further reinforcing this trend, Zodia Markets secured $18.25 million for its digital-asset platform enabling institutional trading via stablecoin rails, with Circle among its backers. Due, a cross-border payments platform that merges stablecoin and fiat rails across more than 80 markets, received $7.3 million. These moves reflect a concerted effort to weave stablecoins into mainstream financial operations, tackling issues such as sluggish cross-border transfers and high transaction fees. The report also notes that the total value of issued stablecoins doubled to $250 billion in the past 18 months, with forecasts to hit over $400 billion by year-end and $2 trillion by 2028.

Decentralized Compute and AI Tooling

The crossroads of crypto and AI likewise attracted hefty capital. Billions, a mobile-first identity network aimed at verifying humans and AI across various applications, raised $30 million from Coinbase, Polychain, and Polygon. Manifold Labs, building a decentralized AI compute layer on Targon and Bittensor networks, secured $10.5 million. These investments point to rising demand for verifiable identities and scalable computational resources in the fast-growing AI sector.

The urgency to meld AI with blockchain technology is echoed in recent market activity. On October 14, 2025, significant discussions surfaced about AI's impact, including accusations that Microsoft was inflating ChatGPT prices through cloud control and Broadcom's CEO forecasting AI-driven growth for the tech sector. Likewise, news of crypto miners spiking due to OpenAI's Broadcom deal on October 13, 2025, underscores the direct link between AI development and demand for decentralized computing power.

Subzero Labs, developing a RISC-V-based blockchain for internet-scale decentralized applications, garnered $20 million. The project aims to provide a sturdy foundation for dApps, a critical piece for AI models that require massive computational capacity and distributed processing. TACEO also secured $5.5 million for its privacy-preserving compute infrastructure, leveraging Zero-Knowledge (ZK) proofs and Multi-Party Computation (MPC) for encrypted data handling-essential for secure AI development and deployment.

Modular Infrastructure and Real-World Asset Tokenization

Investments in modular infrastructure and RWA protocols further diversify the capital flow. KAIO, a new protocol for tokenizing and managing real-world assets, received $11 million from Laser Digital and Brevan Howard. This reflects the expanding ambition to bring illiquid assets onto the blockchain, boosting liquidity and programmability. The wider trend of tokenizing real-world assets is gaining momentum, with initiatives such as Project Guardian exploring tokenized cash for cross-border foreign-exchange and securities trades by the Monetary Authority of Singapore alongside major banks.

STON.fi, a Decentralized Exchange (DEX) and DeFi suite built natively on the TON blockchain, secured $9.5 million. This signals continued interest in crafting robust decentralized finance ecosystems capable of supporting the rising volume of tokenized assets and services. The focus on modular infrastructure highlights a strategic shift toward constructing flexible, scalable, and interoperable blockchain networks able to serve diverse applications, from payments to complex AI computations.

Overall, the week's venture-capital activity confirms that "investor interest continues to converge around programmable money, crypto × AI tooling, and modular infra for scale." The sizable funding rounds reflect a strategic positioning by investors to capitalize on the ongoing transformation of financial services and technological infrastructure.