Solana Exchange Drift Secures $25 Million To Become The ‘Robinhood Of Crypto’

As the cryptocurrency landscape continues to evolve with numerous layer-1 and layer-2 blockchains, the decentralized finance (DeFi) platform Drift is making significant advancements on the Solana (SOL) blockchain. 

Recently, Drift announced a successful $25 million Series B funding round led by crypto venture firm, Multicoin Capital. This funding will help propel Drift’s vision of becoming the “Robinhood of crypto,” according to co-founder Cindy Leow.

How Solana Powers Drift’s Operations

In a recent interview with Fortune, Leow expressed her ambition to establish Drift as a comprehensive on-chain financial institution. The platform plans to expand its suite of financial services, which currently includes spot and derivatives trading and a prediction market, all built atop the Solana blockchain. 

Founded in 2021, Drift operates as a derivatives exchange, distinguishing itself from centralized exchanges (CEXs) like Coinbase and Binance by utilizing a permissionless structure on the Solana blockchain. 

This model ensures that users have complete control over their funds, with no centralized authority managing their assets. While Solana hosts decentralized exchanges (DEXs), Drift separates itself with its diverse product offerings, including borrowing and lending protocols.

Drift Labs, the company behind Drift, develops the software and protocol governed by an associated token (DRIFT) and a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO). 

One of Drift’s most popular products is the perpetual future—a type of derivative contract that allows traders to speculate on the future price of an asset without an expiration date. 

While these products appeal primarily to more sophisticated investors, Drift restricts access to perpetual futures in the US, where only spot trading is available.

One of Drift’s key components is its cross-margining capability, which allows users to use various assets—such as dollar-backed stablecoins, Solana, and wrapped Bitcoin—as collateral for trades. 

Drift Plans To Double Workforce Following Funding Round

According to Fortune, Drift’s growth has attracted significant investment, with over 200,000 users and more than $50 billion in cumulative trading volume. 

The successful Series B round brings Drift’s total funding to $52.5 million, with plans to double its workforce from 25 to 50 within the next year.

Under Leow’s leadership, Drift also stands out as a female-led crypto company. She noted that Drift has one of the highest gender diversities in crypto, with approximately half of its leadership team being women. 

At the time of writing, Solana is trading at $143, up nearly 12% in the last 24 hours alone, outperforming the top ten largest cryptocurrencies on the market, including Bitcoin and Ethereum. 

This rally follows the Federal Reserve’s announcement on Wednesday to cut interest rates by 0.50 basis points, a development that has so far boosted bullish sentiment in the market. 

Featured image from DALL-E, chart from TradingView.com