Upshot Raises $22M Series A2 Led by Polychain to Accelerate Development of Real-Time NFT Appraisals

Blockchain-based, machine learning & crowdsourced NFT appraisal platform aims to become the appraisal authority of the digital asset world

Upshot, a blockchain-based protocol providing industry-leading non-fungible token (NFT) appraisals, today announced a $22 million Series A2 funding round led by Polychain Capital, the world’s premier investor in cryptocurrency protocols and companies. Polychain joins previous investors Framework Ventures, CoinFund, Blockchain Capital, Slow Ventures, Mechanism Capital, and Delphi Digital, among others. Upshot is the first, and leading, technology company that can accurately and reliably appraise the value of digital assets like NFTs at scale. The company plans to use the funds for additional research and development for its pricing models and to build out its growing team. The investment will also help Upshot finance its novel decentralized finance (DeFi) x NFT primitives, and create additional developer tools to allow others to build novel DeFi x NFT primitives leveraging Upshot’s price feeds.

According to DappRadar, the trade volume of NFTs in 2021 was $24.9 billion – up from $95 million in 2020. However, the overall value growth of NFTs – in terms of the user experience, crossover applications within DeFi, and more – has been prevented by the notoriously difficult pricing mechanisms for the digital assets. Real-time, machine learning and expert-sourced appraisals are an intuitive, accurate approach to solving this critical problem.

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“Upshot is the premiere real-time appraisal market that will unlock the next wave of financial primitives for NFT markets.”

“This past year has been one of explosive growth for NFTs, but the inefficient pricing mechanisms for these new assets has significantly limited their potential,” said Upshot co-founder & CEO Nick Emmons. “During that time period, we’ve been working tirelessly to build the best pricing models in the NFT space. We’re incredibly excited to partner with Polychain, one of the premiere crypto funds, as we embark on this next wave of development. With this fundraising round, we’ll be aggressively expanding our team, continuing to improve our industry-leading pricing models, and building out a suite of novel, exotic new primitives at the intersection of DeFi and NFTs.”

The intersection of DeFi and NFTs presents a new, high-growth vertical in the industry. The only way to unlock this vertical, however, is through real-time NFT price feeds. In order to limit volatility and price bubbles within NFTs and create liquid digital assets, issues with scalability and accuracy within the market need to be addressed. Providing the tools for reaching appraisals through industry experts unlocks this potential for DeFi x NFT primitives – including arbitrage, liquidity, leverage, and risk.

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“Polychain is inspired by the vision of a collective intelligence platform rewarding its users for accurately modeling and pricing esoteric assets. Upshot provides deep insight into NFT markets and has already demonstrated the efficacy of their pricing models through industry-leading accuracy metrics, their appraisal of the Sotheby’s Bored Ape Yacht Club batch auction, and more,” said Olaf Carlson-Wee, Founder and CEO of Polychain Capital. “Upshot is the premiere real-time appraisal market that will unlock the next wave of financial primitives for NFT markets.”

“At CoinFund, we are extremely excited to support this next financing of Upshot,” said Jake Brukman, Founder at CoinFund. “Upshot’s appraisal and machine learning technology opens up best in class primitives for bringing liquidity and DeFi to the NFT space and is poised to dramatically expand the set of use cases of nonfungible assets.”