Welcome back to The Breakdown with me, NLW.

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What's going on, guys? It is Monday, September 29th, and today we are talking about Cracken's secret fundraising. Before we get into that, however, if you are enjoying The Breakdown, please go subscribe to it, give it a rating, give it a review, or if you want to dive deeper into the conversation, come join us on the Breakers Discord. You can find a link in the show notes or go to bit.ly slash breakdown pod. Well, friends, Cracken has closed a

huge secret fundraising deal as they prepare to IPO. On Friday, Fortune reported that Cracken

had raised $500 million at a $15 billion valuation. Now, the sourcing was very strange,

with crypto editor Jeff John Roberts writing, this week Fortune learned from a person who was not

authorized to discuss the matter

publicly, that it successfully closed the round this month. The round featured no primary

investor with Cracken itself setting the terms, including the $15 billion valuation. He added

that contributions came from investment managers and venture capitalists without naming any names,

save for co-CEO Argent Sethy in his personal capacity and through his fund, Tribe Capital. This is the first time Cracken has raised money in their 14-year history, aside from an early-stage check of 27 million. So the round provides the first independent valuation of the exchange in over a decade. The reporting came as part of an extensive profile of Sethy, which had Roberts conducting an interview in Sethy's living room room. It discussed the shakeups in Cracken's executive suite at length, concluding that they had

been largely responsible for the IPO getting pushed back into 2026. Siting a former executive,

Roberts wrote, Cracken's many years in business had resulted in more pre-IPO regulation and

operational issues than other firms. That former executive had formed the view that Sethi's disruptive management style was necessary to getting the company prepared to go public. Roberts noted that the pressure is on for Cracken to IPO sooner rather than later. Given this year a string of crypto IPOs are seeing less and less exuberance, there is a strong argument that Cracken should move up their timeline. Sethy, on the other hand, seems content to IPO when the time is right and not race to catch a window that may have already passed.

He referenced strong growth both domestically and internationally, a profitable business model,

and deep liquidity as reasons the exchange is built for the long term, rather than rushing

for the public exit. Now, shortly after the Fortune reporting went live, Bloomberg followed

up with news that

Cracken was in advance talks with another strategic investor. That additional fundraising would

see Cracken take on $200 or $300 million at a $20 billion valuation. Bloomberg reported

that the deal is not yet finalized and remained subject to market conditions. We have zero

indication as of yet of who the new strategic partner is or how

...