Trace Finance raises USD $32 million for expansion

Trace Finance has raised USD $32 million in a Series A round led by CoinFund. The funding will support its expansion in regulated banking and stablecoin settlement infrastructure across Brazil, the United States and other markets.

Other participants included Coinbase Ventures, Haun Ventures, Jump Crypto, Valor Capital, Paxos and HOF Capital. Additional backing came from Chainlink Labs, SNZ Capital and individual investors from the stablecoin, payments and banking sectors.

Trace Finance operates in cross-border payments and stablecoin settlement, focusing on regulated financial infrastructure. It says it has processed more than USD $10 billion in cross-border volume and is the main provider for the top four global payment providers operating in Latin America, including dLocal.

Its early development focused on linking the United States and Brazil, a corridor it describes as a test case for broader international growth. It is now extending that model across Latin America, the United States and Asia-Pacific.

Brazil focus

Brazil has become a central market for the company as regulation reshapes how institutional cross-border flows are handled. Trace Finance says Brazil has classified virtual asset cross-border flows as foreign exchange operations, shifting more institutional volume from non-bank providers to regulated banking infrastructure.

That change has created an opening for companies able to combine local bank access, foreign exchange handling, compliance and stablecoin settlement within a regulated structure. Trace Finance says it built its system in Brazil, where foreign exchange and compliance requirements are among the most complex in global payments.

According to the company, Brazil is one of the five largest markets globally for stablecoin infrastructure concentration. That has helped place the country at the centre of efforts by payments groups, fintechs and digital asset firms to connect stablecoin settlement with mainstream financial rails.

Bernardo Brites, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Trace Finance, outlined the company's view of the market in a statement on the funding round.

"Stablecoins alone do not solve cross-border payments. Stablecoins plus regulated local bank infrastructure does," said Brites.

"This round lets us deepen the banking, payments and compliance infrastructure that global fintechs, exchanges, international banks and enterprises rely on to bridge digital settlement with trusted local financial systems. We built Trace bridging the U.S. to Brazil and are now extending that infrastructure across LatAm and other emerging markets," he said.

Expansion plans

The new capital will be used to increase transaction capacity and expand into new corridors. Trace Finance plans to deepen its products in foreign exchange, bank connectivity, compliance and stablecoin settlement, while expanding its regulated footprint in Brazil, the United States, Asia-Pacific and other priority jurisdictions.

The company is also developing new settlement products on top of its existing banking infrastructure. These are intended to strengthen its role in linking local financial systems in Brazil and the wider Latin American region with global stablecoin liquidity.

The investor syndicate reflects growing interest in the overlap between regulated financial services and digital asset settlement. As policymakers in several markets apply more formal rules to virtual asset flows, infrastructure providers that can operate within banking systems are attracting attention from venture firms and strategic investors.

CoinFund framed the investment around a shift from purely on-chain transactions to systems that connect digital settlement with local banking networks.

"The next phase of global money movement will be won by companies that can bridge onchain settlement with trusted local banking systems," said Einar Braathen, Partner at CoinFund.

"Brazil is one of the largest and most operationally complex payment environments in the world, and Trace has built the regulated infrastructure that global blue-chip businesses are using to scale, while saving time and costs compared to legacy alternatives," he said.

Alongside institutional funds, the Series A also drew support from several high-profile industry figures, including Sean Neville, Co-Founder of Circle; Anatoly Yakovenko, Co-Founder of Solana Labs; Bam Azizi, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Mesh; and Ricardo Villela Marino, Partner and Vice Chairman of Itaú Unibanco.

The deal follows an earlier seed round completed in 2022, led by HOF Capital with participation from Circle Ventures and Mantis VC. With the latest financing, Trace Finance is seeking to expand its role in regulated cross-border settlement as stablecoins move further into mainstream payment and treasury workflows.