Lighter Raises $68M at $1.5B Valuation to Take on Decentralized Derivatives Rivals: Report

Crypto derivatives startup Lighter has closed a $68 million funding round at a $1.5 billion valuation ahead of its token-generation event, backed by high-profile investors including Founders Fund, Ribbit Capital, Haun Ventures and Robinhood Markets, according to a Fortune report.

Founded by Vladimir Novakovski, Lighter is a zk-rollup perpetual-futures exchange built on Ethereum, offering zero fees for retail users and advanced on-chain proofs for order matching and liquidations.

DefiLlama data shows that Lighter has posted a 30-day perpetual trading volume of $279.5 billion, with a 24-hour volume of $10.7 billion and open interest around $1.7 billion. Total value locked (TVL) also stands at $1.15 billion.

The funding round will support the expansion of the platform’s institutional offering, enhanced infrastructure for low-latency trading and full public launch. Lighter aims to challenge the increasingly competitive decentralized derivative exchange sector, which includes Hyperliquid and Aster.

Lighter says it will roll out derivatives on additional chains, deepen liquidity pools and introduce monetization models for institutional counterparties, while retail order-flow remains fee-free.

“Vlad and the team that he’s built is like 85% to 90% of why we made the investment,” Joey Krug, a partner at Founders Fund, told Fortune.