Fence, a financial technology startup leveraging blockchain and smart contracts to modernize the asset-backed finance market, has raised $20 million in a funding round led by Galaxy Ventures, the venture capital arm of Mike Novogratz's Galaxy Digital. ParaFi Capital and Crane Ventures also participated in the round.
The company aims to overhaul a $6 trillion market that still heavily relies on manual processes like spreadsheets, emails, and PDF documents for tasks ranging from loan pool tracking to collateral verification and payment settlement. Fence uses blockchain and tokenization behind the scenes to automate these workflows, creating a single platform for centralized, real-time data updates.
Fence co-founder and CEO Juan Montero stated, “We don’t want to be seen as a blockchain company. We are building the infrastructure for capital markets.” He added, “Others digitize the paperwork. Fence rebuilt the plumbing.” The platform does not market tokens or crypto wallets to its institutional clients; smart contracts operate in the back end to automatically release funds when transaction conditions are met.
Currently, Fence manages approximately $1.5 billion in assets and works with major institutions including BBVA, BlackRock, and Fortress. In its work with BBVA, the company reported lower financing costs for borrowers and a significant reduction in operational workload. The platform can onboard new transactions in weeks, compared to the months required by conventional processes. The fresh capital will be used to accelerate expansion in the United States and continue product development.
Galaxy Digital framed the investment as part of its broader push into tokenized real-world assets (RWA), following moves like its planned multi-chain tokenized money market fund. This funding round signals that large digital asset firms see value in the infrastructure that converts real-world exposures like leases, invoices, and auto loans into on-chain primitives.
