Sam Kessler

Sam is CoinDesk's deputy managing editor for tech and protocols. His reporting is focused on decentralized technology, infrastructure and governance. Sam holds a computer science degree from Harvard University, where he led the Harvard Political Review. He has a background in the technology industry and owns some ETH and BTC. Sam was part of the team that won a 2023 Gerald Loeb Award for CoinDesk's coverage of Sam Bankman-Fried and the FTX collapse.

Sam Kessler

Latest from Sam Kessler


Finance

Katie Haun’s New Fund Joins $10M Round for Polkadot Lending Protocol Moonwell

The project will enable users to take out over-collateralized loans on Polkadot’s EVM-compatible Moonbeam parachain.

(malith d karunarathne/Unsplash)

Finance

Ethereum Staking Protocol Swell Raises $3.75M as Locked ETH Tops $26B

Swell is attempting to make it easier to stake on Ethereum and eventually other blockchains.

Swell (Jeremy Bishop/Unsplash)

Finance

Pantera Leads $4M Seed Round for Streamlined Cross-Chain Bridge

Swim Protocol wants to make it easier for users to swap native assets across blockchains.

(Jonathan Chng/Unsplash)

Finance

‘Minimum Viable DAO’ Product Looks to Supercharge Web 3 Governance

Decent Labs has an opinion on what the future of DAOs should look like, and it’s baking it into a new set of tools.

(Martin Rancourt/Unsplash)

Finance

Diagonal Raises $2.5M for Web 3 Subscription Payments

The project aims to create an all-in-one tool for merchants and creators to collect payments on Ethereum.

(Adrien Olichon/Unsplash)

Finance

Polymer’s $3.6M in Seed Funding Says IBC Is the Future of Crypto

The team plans to make blockchains like Ethereum and Solana more easily compatible with chains built using Cosmos’ Inter-Blockchain Communication protocol.

(FLY:D/Unsplash)P

Finance

Hedge Fund Giant Alan Howard Backs $7.5M Round for ‘Financial NFTs’ Project

Nested’s social trading platform allows investors to earn royalties on their crypto portfolios by representing them as NFTs.

Billionaire hedge fund manager Alan Howard.

Finance

Dialect Raises $4.1M to Bring ‘Smart Messaging’ to Solana

The project wants Solana-based DeFi apps to have actionable alerts and wallet-to-wallet chat.

Functional notifications, a staple of Web 2, are still novel in Web 3. (Jonas Leupe/Unsplash)

Finance

Cosmos Builder Tendermint Rebrands to ‘Ignite’ as Team Shifts Focus

Ignite says it’s now a “product-first” company focused on its Cosmos portfolio manager and blockchain development platform.

(Gary Ellis/Unsplash)