In brief
- Coinbase is acquiring the token management platform Liquifi.
- The platform is used already by the Uniswap Foundation and OP Labs.
- The deal represents another major acquisition for Coinbase this year.
Coinbase is acquiring Liquifi, a token management platform designed to help early-stage projects, the crypto exchange said in a blog post on Wednesday.
The company, which is being bought for an undisclosed sum, previously raised $5 million in a 2022 funding round that included participation from former Coinbase CTO Balaji Srinivasan and Anthony Pompliano, the entrepreneur and social media personality, according to Cryptorank.
Allowing organizations to manage a “high-stakes maze of legal, tax, and compliance hurdles,” among other pitfalls associated with the cryptosphere, Coinbase said that Liquifi is already being tapped by entities including the Uniswap Foundation and OP Labs. The platform is a “practical step” toward its goal of making it easier to build on-chain, Coinbase added.
Decrypt has reached out to Coinbase for additional comment.
Coinbase’s purchase of Liquifi represents its fifth major acquisition this year, according to Cryptorank. Coinbase has also acquired the browser product Roam, the on-chain ads platform Spindl, and the futures exchange Deribit for $2.9 billion. In addition, Coinbase acquired the team behind Iron Fish, a privacy-focused network.
Acquiring Spindl and Iron Fish’s team align with “key infrastructure upgrades” for Coinbase’s layer-2 scaling network Base, the company said in a shareholder letter this year, adding that it’s “laying the foundation for global-scale app adoption.”
Under Coinbase, Liquifi will help businesses building on-chain, with vesting and compliance features that the company says represent barriers for businesses today. Used by popular crypto projects to manage governance tokens, in theory, the platform could help more traditional firms integrate tokens into their business model.
In the blog post, Coinbase said that Liquifi allows investors to manage token holdings as well, and that some of Liquifi’s features will be folded into Coinbase Prime, the company’s brokerage platform aimed at institutional investors.
Coinbase shares rose 2.4% on Wednesday, changing hands around $343.50, according to Yahoo Finance. The company’s stock has rallied 37% year-to-date, and the firm’s shares notched their highest closing price on record last week.
Edited by James Rubin
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