MIAMI, August 25, 2026

Firelight, a decentralized cover protocol designed to protect capital across DeFi and the broader on-chain financial ecosystem, has raised initial funding on an $8 million seed round led by Gumi Cryptos Capital, with participation from Maven 11, Metalayer, Joint Effects and Tribe Capital.

Firelight is a decentralized cover protocol that protects onchain capital against protocol, smart contract and economic risks. Incubated by institutional DeFi provider Sentora, Firelight aims to address a key barrier to institutional DeFi adoption: the limited availability of robust, credible protection against onchain exploits and smart contract failures.

Firelight uses assets with low correlation to DeFi markets as the capital base for its cover protocol, starting with XRP and expanding to BTC and XLM in the near future. This structure provides an independent pool of protection capital that can be used to cover DeFi vaults and protocols. The protocol, together with its first cover integrations, is scheduled to go live in September. 

The funding comes as DeFi adoption expands beyond crypto-native institutions into fintechs, neobanks and other financial platforms. As these companies increasingly integrate onchain yield and other DeFi services, demand is growing much faster than the infrastructure available to protect the capital behind them. Despite roughly $80 billion in total value locked, only a fraction of a percent is currently protected by onchain cover, creating a rapidly widening gap between demand for DeFi services and capital protection. 

The team combines deep experience across institutional markets, DeFi and risk management. Sentora co-founders Anthony DeMartino and Jesus Rodriguez serve as CEO and CTO of Firelight, respectively, while retaining their existing roles at Sentora. DeMartino previously led Risk Strategies at Coinbase following a two-decade career in traditional markets, while Rodriguez is a computer scientist and multi-exit founder. They are joined by Chief Strategy Officer Connor Sullivan, who came to Firelight from Fireblocks following a career in reinsurance underwriting. 

Firelight is already working with some of the industry’s leading crypto institutions and DeFi protocols, with the first integrations expected to launch over the next few weeks as the protocol goes live. Coverage events will be assessed by the DeFi Risk Consortium, an independent group of leading security and risk firms including GFX Labs, Hypernative, Credora, Native and Cyfrin, using transparent onchain attestation to validate claims. 

“Protocol cover and capital protection remain among the biggest blockers to institutional adoption of DeFi,” said Anthony DeMartino, co-founder and CEO of Firelight. “Institutions need confidence that they can deploy capital onchain with credible protection against smart contract and economic risk. Firelight is building the infrastructure to provide that protection at scale, across protocols, vaults and a growing range of onchain financial products.” 

The funding will support continued protocol development, the expansion of Firelight's cover enablement offering, and the growth of its ecosystem partnerships.

About Firelight Protocol

Firelight Protocol is a decentralized cover enablement protocol building transparent, structured protection offerings to enable protection against protocol and smart contract risk across the DeFi ecosystem. Incubated by institutional DeFi provider Sentora and backed by Flare Network, Firelight uses staked XRP to enable protocol operations, including establishing the capital backing cover implementations.

About The Firelight Team

The leadership team behind Firelight constitutes Jesus Rodriguez, Anthony DeMartino, and Connor Sullivan, boasting a wealth of expertise across institutional DeFi, risk management and insurance.

Anthony DeMartino, CEO and Co-Founder of Firelight and Sentora, has two decades of experience running multiple trading businesses across top-level banks such as HSBC, Barclays, and UBS. Previously, DeMartino was head of Coinbase Risk Strategies, focusing on DeFi and Derivatives trading. 

Jesus Rodriguez is a computer scientist and entrepreneur focused on frontier technology and institutional finance. He is a co-founder and CPO of Sentora and Firelight and has co-founded several AI companies, including NeuralFabric, acquired by Cisco, and LayerLens, an AI evaluation company. Jesus is also the author of the acclaimed AI newsletter The Sequence and has lectured at Columbia, MIT and Wharton. 

Connor Sullivan is Chief Strategy Officer at Firelight, where he leads the development of an onchain coverage layer for DeFi. Before Firelight, he spent five years at Fireblocks across institutional partnerships and corporate strategy, following an earlier career in global reinsurance as an underwriter at TransRe. He writes and speaks regularly on DeFi risk, institutional adoption, and the evolution of onchain insurance.