- Cycles raises $6.4M led by Blockchange Ventures to build a private clearing network for crypto markets and stablecoin payments
- Founded by Ethan Buchman after spinning out of Informal Systems, the startup aims to reduce liquidity bottlenecks and settlement risks in digital assets
- Fresh capital will help scale Cycles Prime and Cycles Pay, with Lynq and FalconX joining as anchor partners
Crypto markets move trillions of dollars, yet they still lack one of the most basic tools that traditional finance has relied on for decades: clearing infrastructure.
In conventional markets, clearing networks offset obligations between counterparties so that only net balances are settled, freeing up liquidity and reducing risk. In crypto, that system largely does not exist. Firms have to fully prefund trades, tying up billions in capital and leaving markets exposed when conditions turn. That vulnerability became concrete in October 2025, when over $19 billion in crypto leverage was liquidated within a single day.
Cycles was built to solve that. The startup has raised $6.4 million in a seed round led by Blockchange Ventures, with Coinbase Ventures, Compound VC, Primitive Ventures, and angel investors participating. The raise brings total funding to $8.7 million, following a $2.3 million pre-seed in 2025.
The company was spun out of Informal Systems and is led by Ethan Buchman, a co-creator of the Cosmos blockchain. Cycles uses zero-knowledge proofs, trusted execution environments, and multilateral clearing technology to privately net obligations across participants. Rather than moving full amounts between counterparties, the system calculates net balances, cutting liquidity requirements and counterparty exposure in the process.
“Clearing is a financial superpower that has historically only been available to large financial institutions,” said Buchman. “Our goal is to bring that superpower to everyone else, through a privacy-preserving clearing network with capital efficiency at its core, and without centralised intermediaries.”
The company’s first institutional product, Cycles Prime, allows OTC trading firms to settle obligations privately without moving collateral or changing counterparties. It launches with Lynq and FalconX as anchor partners. A second product, Cycles Pay, targets businesses and individuals, enabling stablecoin payments, invoice management, and balance optimisation through the same clearing engine.
FalconX trade operations lead Matt Lepow framed the partnership in pointed terms. “Legacy settlement rails were not built for today’s 24/7 global markets,” he said. “As a pilot partner for Cycles Prime, FalconX is proud to contribute to a more capital-efficient method for institutions to manage short-term obligations.”
The market Cycles is entering is well-populated. Fireblocks, Copper, Ripple, and a growing field of stablecoin payment providers are all competing for institutional settlement infrastructure. But most of those players are focused on custody, payments, or compliance. Cycles is making a different argument: that clearing and capital efficiency will become the defining battleground as institutional crypto adoption matures, and that the category does not yet have a winner.
Rob Schmults, general partner at Blockchange Ventures, put it directly. “Cycles can become a category-defining standard for how value is settled and netted across entire ecosystems and markets.”
The new funding will be used to accelerate development of the Cycles clearing network and scale both Cycles Prime and Cycles Pay across trading firms, businesses, and payment flows.
