DeFi

Yield Guild Games

April

Yield

Decentralized finance (DeFi) analytics platform Zapper announced it will shut down next month, becoming the latest crypto platform to fold amid a market downturn.In a post to X on Wednesday, Zapper CEO Seb Audet <a href="https://x.com/sebaudet26/status/2074918469376856150" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">said</a> Zapper’s website, mobile app and API services would shut down on Aug. 3, marking the end of a seven-year run after receiving backing from the likes of billionaire investor Mark Cuban in 2021.“We evaluated a number of different options, pursued some to the fullest extent possible, and came to the realization that an orderly wind down is the best course of action,” Audet said.While Zapper didn’t share the reasons behind its decision to shut down, Audet <a href="https://x.com/sebaudet26/status/2074924001349034244" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">hinted </a>in a response that the shutdown was due to falling demand, stating: “At the end of the day, the market decides.”Cointelegraph reached out for comment but didn’t receive an immediate response.<img alt="" height="612" src="https://s3-images.ctmedia.io/media/content/pasted-image-1956.png" width="691">Source: <a href="https://x.com/zapper_fi/status/2074919126183608480" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Zapper</a>Zapper adds to a growing list of crypto platforms that have shut as crypto market sentiment has <a href="https://alternative.me/crypto/fear-and-greed-index/" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">sunk</a> to near all-time lows and venture capital funding has become <a href="https://www.rootdata.com/dashboard" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">harder</a> to secure.Cardano-based analytics platform <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/cardano-protocol-taptools-winds-down-after-five-execs-exit" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">TapTools made a similar decision</a> to shut down in June, as did Bitcoin-focused DeFi platform <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/botanix-says-it-didnt-work-as-bitcoin-scaling-platform-shuts-down-sets-withdrawal-deadline" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Botanix</a> a week later, citing weak demand for Bitcoin DeFi.SBI’s <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/sbi-bitcoin-mining-pool-shutdown-five-years" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">crypto unit,</a> decentralized email service <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/dmail-network-shutdown-decentralized-email-costs-funding-failure" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Dmail</a>, and nonfungible token marketplaces like <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/nifty-gateway-shutdown-nft-marketplace-closure-2026" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Nifty Gateway</a> and <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/rodeo-becomes-2nd-nft-platform-announce-closure-this-week" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Rodeo</a> have also sunset operations this year amid a broader fall in NFT activity.Related: <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/yield-guild-games-cuts-35-staff-shuts-game-publisher-to-focus-on-ai" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Yield Guild Games cuts 35 staff, shuts game publisher to focus on AI</a>Zapper was founded in 2019 and put itself on the map by winning one of Kyber's DeFi Hackathon events later that year, which helped it raise a $1.5 million seed round.It also raised $15 million in a Series A funding round in May 2021, led by Framework Ventures, with Cuban, Coinbase Ventures and the Ashton Kutcher-founded Sound Ventures also contributing.Crypto traders use platforms like Zapper to track token prices, follow DeFi trends and discover new protocols. Zapper also allowed traders to connect their wallets to monitor positions, manage liquidity pools and yield farms and learn about upcoming airdrops.Audet said the Zapper team scaled its product to over 2 million monthly active users and oversaw more than $13 billion in processed transactions at its peak.However, Zapper has experienced major setbacks throughout its journey, including in April 2025, when it suffered a social engineering attack. The breach allowed attackers to temporarily hijack the platform's domain and redirect unsuspecting users to a malicious page embedded with phishing traps.<h2 id="securing-vc-funding-has-become-a-challenge">Securing VC funding has become a challenge</h2>While crypto VC funding increased 57.6% year-on-year to $4.21 billion in the second quarter, the spread of capital has become far more concentrated, with the overall deal count having now fallen nine times over the last 10 quarters, according to RootData’s VC dashboard.<img alt="" height="515" src="https://s3-images.ctmedia.io/media/content/pasted-image-1957.png" width="893"> Quarterly change in crypto VC funding and deal count since Q1 2020. Source: <a href="https://www.rootdata.com/dashboard" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">RootData</a>Features: <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/features/from-bitcoin-critics-to-blockchain-believers-the-5-biggest-crypto-backflips" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">From Bitcoin critics to blockchain believers: The 5 biggest crypto backflips</a>

Mark Cuban-backed DeFi dashboard Zapper shutters after 7 years

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