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Surf, an AI platform built for digital-asset analysis, raised $15 million to expand its AI models and enterprise tools in a round led by Pantera Capital with participation from Coinbase Ventures and DCG.
The company offers a domain-specific model used by exchanges and research companies to analyze onchain activity, market behavior and sentiment. The funding will go toward Surf 2.0, which will introduce more advanced models, broader proprietary data sets and additional agents designed to handle multi-step analytical tasks.
Surf <a href="https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/surf-raises-15m-to-scale-the-first-ai-model-purpose-built-for-digital-assets-302638051.html" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" target="_blank">said</a> its platform has seen rapid uptake since its launch in July, generating more than one million research reports and claiming millions in annual recurring revenue, with usage from a large share of major exchanges and research firms.
Surf’s model uses a multi-agent architecture that evaluates onchain data, social sentiment and token activity, delivering its analysis through a chat interface for research and reducing manual workloads for analysts and traders.
Related: <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/how-to-turn-chatgpt-into-your-personal-crypto-trading-assistant" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" target="_self">How to turn ChatGPT into your personal crypto trading assistant</a>
<h2 id="the-continued-integration-of-ai-and-digital-assets">The continued integration of AI and digital assets</h2>
Artificial intelligence and blockchain are increasingly intersecting as more companies develop tools that leverage both technologies.
In April, decentralized AI startup Nous Research closed a <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/nous-research-raises-50m-paradigm-decentralized-ai-solana" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">$50 million Series A round led by Paradigm</a>. The company is developing open-source AI models powered by decentralized infrastructure and uses the Solana blockchain to coordinate and incentivize global participation in training.
In May, Catena Labs, led by Circle co-founder Sean Neville, announced it had <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/catena-labs-raises-18m-ai-native-financial-institution" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">raised $18 million </a>to develop a bank built around native AI infrastructure. The company said the system will be designed for both AI agents and human contributors, with AI handling day-to-day operations under human supervision.
In October, Coinbase introduced “Based Agent,” a tool that lets users <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/coinbase-based-agent-ai-agent-crypto-transactions-brian-armstrong-base" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">create an AI agent</a> with an integrated crypto wallet in just a few minutes to perform onchain actions such as trading, swapping, and staking.
As crypto and AI continue to converge, the role of human traders may also be shifting. The decentralized exchange Aster is running a “human vs AI” trading showdown, <a href="https://docs.asterdex.com/trading-campaign/human-vs-ai-battle-for-the-futures-usd200-000-reward-pool" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" target="_blank">funding</a> up to 100 human traders with $10,000 each to compete against top-performing AI agents Dec. 9–23.&nbsp;
Though the competition still has 13 days to go, Team Human was in the <a href="https://www.asterdex.com/en/campaigns/human-vs-ai" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" target="_blank">lead</a> as of Wednesday, with a return on investment (ROI) of 13.36% compared to Team AI’s ROI of 0.54%.
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 <img alt="Pantera, Coinbase back Surf’s $15M push to build crypto-native AI models" src="https://s3.cointelegraph.com/uploads/2025-12/019b0a0a-529d-7e7b-b58a-9993a63f4cf0" title="">
 <figcaption style="text-align: center;">
 Human vs. AI trading scoreboard. Source: <a href="https://www.asterdex.com/en/campaigns/human-vs-ai" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" target="_blank">Asterdex.com</a>
 </figcaption>
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Magazine: <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/magazine/quantum-attacking-bitcoin-would-be-a-waste-of-time-kevin-oleary/" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" target="_self">Quantum attacking Bitcoin would be a waste of time: Kevin O’Leary</a>

Pantera, Coinbase back Surf’s $15M push to build crypto-native AI models

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