A bridge round in crypto is a top-up raise taken between 2 priced rounds, usually to reach a token launch or a larger round, and it is almost never written down as one: of the 8,669 funding rows NAUT read on 7 November 2026, 1 carries the round type Bridge Round and 13 more carry an extension type. NAUT's data shows the 4 signals that mark the other ones, measured across 3,418 round pairs at 1,689 companies with 2 or more tracked rounds, and this article runs all 4 on the single labelled round in the set, a $3,300,000 raise by E Money Network.
How this was built: on 7 November 2026 NAUT read every funding row it holds, grouped the rows by company, and measured each consecutive pair of rounds where both rows carry an announce date. That is 3,418 pairs. Every count below is NAUT's coverage of the market on that date, not the whole market, and the labels are the labels a tracker or an announcement used, so a round can be a bridge in substance and carry the type Private or Strategic on its row. 13 claims about the worked company and its backers went to public sources on 7 November 2026: 10 came back confirmed, 3 came back contradicted, and 9 of the 10 are used here.
What is a bridge round in crypto?
It is money raised between priced rounds, on the previous round's terms or on a note, to carry a team to the next event: a token generation event, a listing, a product launch, or a priced round the team wants to raise at a higher price. Founders call it a bridge because it spans a gap. Investors read bridge financing as either conviction or a runway problem, which is why the label is rare in public: 1 of 8,669 NAUT rows uses it.
The sibling label is the extension round, which tops up a named stage at the same price. NAUT's 8,669 rows hold 13 of those: 6 typed Seed Extension Round, 4 Series A Extension, 1 Extension Round, 1 Seed extension 2 Round and 1 Series B Extension. Bridge and extension together come to 14 rows, so a founder or a BD lead who screens on the label alone will find 14 deals in a database of 8,669.
The 4 signals that mark a bridge round
Because the label is missing almost everywhere, the work is reading the shape of the round. 4 signals do it, and each one is worth a different amount:
- The label, when it exists. 14 of 8,669 rows carry a bridge or extension type.
- The gap to the round before it. 3,005 of the 3,418 dated pairs are under 12 months apart, 87.9% of them, so a tight gap is the normal rhythm of crypto fundraising and tells you little on its own.
- The size against the round before it. 1,644 of the 3,418 pairs raise less than the previous round, 48.1%, so this is the signal that cuts the set roughly in half.
- The position in the company's timeline: a raise that sits between a priced round and a public token event, with a smaller raise behind it or ahead of it.
- Read the label14 of NAUT's 8,669 funding rows carry a bridge or extension type, so the label alone finds 14 deals.
- Date the gap3,005 of 3,418 dated round pairs sit under 12 months apart, so a tight gap is the base rate.
- Compare the size1,644 of the 3,418 pairs raise less than the round before, which is the signal that halves the set.
- Find the token eventE Money Network's $3,300,000 round sits between its 2021 ICO and its January 2025 IDO.
Signals 2 and 3 are read together, never alone. NAUT's data holds each one separately, so the share of pairs that are both tighter than a year and smaller than the round before is not a figure this article measured.
How do the 4 signals read on 1 funded startup?
E Money Network is the only company in NAUT's 8,669 rows with a round typed Bridge Round, so it is the one case where the label and the shape can be checked against each other. NAUT holds 6 funding rows for it, $5,995,000 in total, listed below in NAUT's own dated order with the 3 undated rows first. Round is the type NAUT stores, and Gap measures each dated round against the dated round before it.
| Round | Amount | Announced | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| Seed | $375,000 | No date stored | Not datable |
| Private | $750,000 | No date stored | Not datable |
| Private 2 | $1,200,000 | No date stored | Not datable |
| ICO | $150,000 | 27 October 2021 | First dated round |
| Bridge Round | $3,300,000 | 30 May 2024 | 2 years 7 months |
| IDO | $220,000 | 22 January 2025 | 7 months 23 days |
Run the 4 signals on the Bridge Round row and 2 of them fire. The label is there, and the position is there: the round sits after a priced ICO and before the IDO that opened the token to the public 7 months later, which is the classic bridge shape. The other 2 do not fire on this row. Its gap to the previous dated round is 2 years 7 months, well outside the 12-month pattern that covers 87.9% of dated pairs, and at $3,300,000 it is 22 times the dated round before it rather than smaller. The signals fire instead on the round that follows: the IDO came 7 months 23 days later at $220,000, which is 15 times smaller.
The data note matters here. 3 of the 6 rows, the Seed, Private and Private 2, carry no announce date on NAUT, so they cannot be placed on the gap signal at all, and the ICO of 27 October 2021 is the earliest dated row the bridge round can be measured against. A reader pricing a similar raise should treat the 2 years 7 months as the gap between dated rows, not as the gap since the company last took money.
2 more things a deal maker should know before quoting this round. NAUT's record for it links an X post that the source check found had been deleted by its author; a reply still live in the same thread is timestamped 31 May 2024, while NAUT stores the announce date as 30 May 2024. And the company traded under another name for most of this timeline: a KuCoin announcement of 20 November 2024 states "KuCoin will support the rebranding of Scallop (SCLP) to E Money Network (EMYC)." The 2021 ICO therefore sits on NAUT under the newer name. The source NAUT read for that ICO, ICO Drops, shows a public sale of "$140,000 at $0.15 per token" dated 31 October 2021, while NAUT's ICO row holds $150,000 for the round.
Who backed the bridge round, and who can you contact?
NAUT's record names 8 firms on the round, each with its own NAUT page: Animoca Brands sits there as a project row, the other 7 as investor rows. 7 of the 8 came back confirmed against a public source on 7 November 2026 and 6 are in the table: the 7th, Banter Capital, is named in the same 5 June 2024 X post, and the check found no second page tying that firm to the handle NAUT stores, so it is listed here and left out of the table. The 8th, Kucoin Labs, came back contradicted: the post and the company's own posts name KuCoin at group level and none of them name the Labs arm, so NAUT's row for this slot needs a fix before anyone cites it.
| Firm | What the check found |
|---|---|
 Animoca Brands |
Named as the round's lead in a 5 June 2024 X post, handle matched on animocabrands.com |
 GBV Capital |
Named in that post, handle matched on gbv.capital |
 Momentum 6 |
Named in that post, handle matched on momentum6.com |
 Morningstar Ventures |
Named in that post and in its own write-up of the round |
 Black Edge Capital |
Named in that post as Blackedge Capital, handle matched to blackedge.io |
 Blockchain Founders Fund |
Named in that post, handle matched on blockchainff.com |
The lead is worth a line of its own, because it is the name a founder quotes and a BD lead sells to. NAUT's 8 backer rows for this round carry no lead flag, so NAUT's record holds no lead for it; the 5 June 2024 post the check read names Animoca Brands as the lead. That gap between a stored flag and a public source is the usual reason a cap table reads wrong, and it is the same check described in How to find the lead investor: 3 ways, tested on 20 rounds.
On the company side, NAUT lists 3 people at E Money Network, among them Raj Bagadi. NAUT stores his title as Co-Founder and CEO, and the source check found public pages giving the title as Founder and CEO, so take the exact wording from the company's own site before you use it in a note. Anyone listed can ask NAUT to remove their page at https://naut.so/legal/data-deletion.
How to screen for a bridge round on NAUT
The screen for a crypto bridge round is 3 filters on a company page and 1 question for the founder.
- Open the company's NAUT page and read every funding row in date order, including the undated ones. 1,689 companies on NAUT carry 2 or more rounds.
- Mark any row that lands under 12 months after the row before it. That is the base rate, 87.9% of dated pairs, so it only sets up the next filter.
- Mark any row smaller than the row before it. 1,644 of 3,418 pairs do this, and a row that is both tighter than a year and smaller is the one to ask about.
- Then ask what the money was for. A round before a token event, a listing or a priced round at a higher price is a bridge whatever its label says.
For a BD team this is a timing tool. A company that raised a smaller round soon after a larger one is buying months, which usually means a shorter budget and a faster decision on anything that moves its launch date. For a founder it is a pricing tool: the 48.1% figure is the honest background against which an investor reads a smaller follow-on, and the labelled example here raised $3,300,000 with 8 backer rows on NAUT, 7 of them confirmed on a public source.
How many crypto rounds carry an extension or a bridge round label?
14 of the 8,669 funding rows NAUT read on 7 November 2026, which is 1 in 619. The split is 1 Bridge Round, 6 Seed Extension Round, 4 Series A Extension, 1 Extension Round, 1 Seed extension 2 Round and 1 Series B Extension. Every other top-up in the set is filed under the type its tracker or its announcement used, which is why the 3 shape signals carry the work.
Related reading on NAUT: Crypto funding stages: 85 rounds, medians $1.85M to $60M and How to find the lead investor: 3 ways, tested on 20 rounds.
Can you pull this data through the NAUT API?
Yes. GET https://api.naut.so/v1/projects/e-money-network returns the worked company with its team, and GET https://api.naut.so/v1/investors/gbv-capital returns a fund's portfolio with each row's roundType, amountUsd, announceDate and isLead, which are the 4 fields the signals above are read from. Every call is GET with Authorization: Bearer $NAUT_KEY, costs 5 credits, and the plans and quotas are at naut.so/pricing with the parameters at naut.so/docs/api. Verified Telegram, email and LinkedIn for the people on these pages unlock on any paid NAUT plan, so start a 7-day trial if you need to reach them.
Bridge round FAQ
What is a bridge round in crypto?
A bridge round is money raised between 2 priced rounds, often on the previous round's terms or on a note, to carry a crypto team to a token launch, a listing or a larger round. Of the 8,669 funding rows NAUT read on 7 November 2026, 1 carries the type Bridge Round and 13 carry an extension type.
How do you tell a bridge round from a normal round?
Read 3 numbers off the company's funding history: the gap to the round before it, the size against that round, and what event sits just after it. 3,005 of NAUT's 3,418 dated round pairs are under 12 months apart, so the gap alone proves nothing, and 1,644 of 3,418 raise less than the round before, so a round that is both tight and smaller is the one to ask about.
Which crypto company has a bridge round on NAUT?
E Money Network, formerly Scallop, with a $3,300,000 round that NAUT dates 30 May 2024 and 8 backer rows on its record. It sits between a $150,000 ICO of 27 October 2021 and a $220,000 IDO of 22 January 2025.
Where can I find the funds that back bridge rounds and their contact channels?
On NAUT's investor pages and through the NAUT API: 6 of the 8 firms on this round are listed above with a confirmed public source, among them Animoca Brands and GBV Capital, and GET https://api.naut.so/v1/investors/gbv-capital returns a fund's team and portfolio for 5 credits. Verified Telegram, email and LinkedIn for those people unlock on any paid NAUT plan, so start a 7-day trial to open them.
Is an extension round the same as a bridge round?
They do the same job and read slightly differently on a cap table: an extension tops up a named stage, usually at the same price, while a bridge is often a note that converts at the next round. NAUT's 8,669 rows hold 13 extension-typed rounds and 1 Bridge Round.
Sources
- NAUT's own database of crypto funding rounds, read on 7 November 2026: 8,669 funding rows, the round type and amount on each, 1,689 companies with 2 or more rounds, 3,418 consecutive round pairs where both rows carry an announce date, and the 8 backer rows and 3 people on E Money Network.
- The rebrand from Scallop to E Money Network: KuCoin's announcement of 20 November 2024, with the company's own structure page at blog.emoney.io.
- The 2021 ICO: ICO Drops, public sale 31 October 2021, with Coinlore as a second page.
- The January 2025 IDO on the eesee launchpad: the launchpad's own post of 21 January 2025, with CoinCarp as a second page.
- The backers named on the 2024 bridge round: a 5 June 2024 X post, checked firm by firm against each firm's own site. The X post NAUT stores as the round's source had been deleted by its author when the check ran on 7 November 2026.
- 13 claims about this company and its backers were put to public sources on 7 November 2026. 10 came back confirmed and 3 contradicted. The 3 contradicted claims, the announce date of the bridge round, the Kucoin Labs row and the founder's exact title, are reported above as what the check found and are not used as facts here.