DeFi Startup Qiro Finance Bags Funding From Alliance, Others

Decentralised finance (DeFi) startup Qiro Finance has secured $1.2 Mn (around INR 10 Cr) in its pre-seed funding round led by an Web3 accelerator Alliance. 

The round also saw participation from Escape Velocity, CMT Digital and entities like Trident Digital and Druid Ventures. 

The startups plans to use the fresh funds for its product development, scaling up its workforce and ecosystem expansion. 

Besides, it aims to launch mainnet (end product of a blockchain project) within the current year. 

Founded in 2023 by Akshay Poshatwar and Nishikant Bahalkar, Qiro Finance is an asset-backed decentralised financial lending platform. It focuses on building a decentralised credit protocol to connect emerging market asset originators (NBFIs) with global investors by leveraging blockchain and stablecoin rails. Qiro serves in the B2B space around wholesale lending. 

Stablecoins are a type of cryptocurrency whose value is tied to another asset class to keep a stable, steady value.

It aims to bridge the credit gap prevalent in emerging markets. This gap is attributed to the dominance of banks in the credit market and their risk-averse approach. 

“Real World Assets (RWAs) are gaining traction, signalling a noteworthy shift as traditional firms pursue alternative financing avenues embedded in crypto. This trend not only broadens global financing options but also fosters enhanced accessibility,” said Imran Khan, founder of Alliance.

This comes at a time when the Reserve Bank of India has been critical of cryptocurrency, saying they pose systemic risk to the financial systems. Besides, a 30% tax on cryptocurrency sales and 1% TDS on crypto transactions above INR 10,000 have also been imposed. 

Despite this, Bitcoin made a remarkable rally in March, hitting more than $73K in March 2024, soaring past its previous peak of almost $69K in November 2021. 

Following this, the overall market cap of the cryptocurrencies in circulation spiked to $2.5 Tn, falling just 10% short of its all-time high of $2.8 Tn. 

Not to mention, India now ranks among the top five countries in peer-to-peer (P2P) crypto trading and 75% of Indian users opting for centralised exchanges (CEXs) are aged below 35.