Block Street raises US$11.5 million to build on-chain stock trading infrastructure

Blockchain startup Block Street, which is building trading infrastructure for on-chain stocks, said it has closed a funding round of US$11.5 million (about KRW 16.3 billion).

According to crypto-focused media CoinDesk on the 9th, the round was led by Hack VC and included Generative Venture, DWF Labs, as well as executives from global investment firms such as Jane Street and Point72.

Block Street is developing infrastructure to process stock trading in an on-chain environment as quickly and reliably as in traditional financial markets. To this end, it is building two core systems, Aqua and Everst.

Aqua is a trading platform running on the Monad blockchain that automatically selects the best quote when multiple market makers present prices simultaneously. All trade records are cryptographically signed and verified and processed directly on-chain. Block Street says this can minimize price manipulation and trading delays.

Everst is a system that combines lending and liquidation functions with tokenized stock trading. Users can use it to borrow funds against stock collateral or execute short-selling and hedge trades. The company said this structure will reduce losses from MEV (maximum extractable value) and make tokenized stocks real financial assets rather than mere investment instruments.

Hedy Wang, co-founder of Block Street, said, "We are focused on building infrastructure, not a simple app," adding, "Monad's parallel EVM architecture ensures settlement stability and speed at institutional investor levels, and Aqua and Everst implement equity risk management and an optimal execution environment on-chain."

Meanwhile, Block Street plans to launch its official service on the Monad mainnet later this year and then expand integration to Ethereum, BNB Chain, Base, and others. The company also plans to build a transparency dashboard that will publish comparisons of trading efficiency with automated market makers (AMMs).

The outlet reported, "Financial and technology experts from Citadel, Point72, Google, and others are participating in this project," adding, "Block Street's technology is expected to solve the speed and reliability issues of on-chain securities trading and lower barriers to entry for institutional investors."