Cascade raises $15 million and launches the first 24/7 all-day US stock and crypto perpetual trading platform

New York startup Cascade officially debuts, launching what it claims to be the world’s first “new-style broker” based on an autonomous financial platform model, providing users with a unified margin account and 24/7 perpetual contract trading across cryptocurrencies, US stocks, and private assets. The platform has secured $15 million in funding from top institutions including Polychain Capital, Variant, and Coinbase Ventures, aiming to bring real-time settlement and transparent risk control mechanisms validated in DeFi into mainstream trading scenarios.

Cascade’s core narrative is to build an “autonomous” financial infrastructure to address the systemic fragility caused by traditional finance’s reliance on manual intermediaries and intermittent settlement. Its early access program will launch soon, with full open access planned for early 2026.

What is Cascade? Redefining the boundaries of “brokerage”

Simply put, Cascade attempts to be a bridge connecting the traditional financial world with the native crypto financial system, but it is neither a traditional brokerage app nor a decentralized exchange. It defines itself as an “autonomous new-style broker,” with the ultimate goal of providing a single account that allows users to 7/24 trade Tesla and Apple perpetual stocks or gain synthetic exposure to private assets like OpenAI and SpaceX, while also directly interfacing with banks for fiat deposits and withdrawals.

Behind this design is a deep reflection on the current fragmented financial market structure. Traditional brokerage systems are built on T+2 settlement, weekday trading, and layered manual intermediaries (brokers, clearinghouses, market makers), resulting in inefficiency and operational risks. While crypto markets enable 7/24 trading and on-chain instant settlement, they present high barriers for most traditional investors, lacking familiar interfaces and fiat channels. Cascade’s ambition is to combine the advantages of both: retain the familiar brokerage experience, but support it with a code-driven “autonomous financial platform” that enables real-time risk management and continuous settlement.

Therefore, understanding Cascade hinges on recognizing that it is not just a product overlay but a paradigm shift. It aims to reconstruct the entire “financial pipeline” from execution and clearing to settlement, allowing markets to operate seamlessly in an era of perpetual information flow.

Core innovation: 24/7 perpetual markets and unified margin accounts

Cascade’s most impactful feature is extending the crypto industry’s familiar “perpetual contract” trading model to traditional stocks and private assets. This means investors can, like trading Bitcoin perpetuals, go long or short Tesla or Apple stock at any time, any day, without waiting for US stock market hours. This is not just an extension of trading hours but a revolution in derivatives structuring and liquidity provision.

Supporting this experience is Cascade’s “Unified Margin Account.” Users can deposit fiat, cryptocurrencies, stock holdings, and other assets into a single account as a unified collateral pool. From there, they can conduct cross-asset trading, lending, and gain exposure to synthetic assets. This design greatly improves capital efficiency and simplifies fund management across multiple markets and accounts. More importantly, the account is directly linked to the user’s bank account, enabling seamless, direct fiat and trading fund flows.

Key information about the Cascade platform

Positioning: The world’s first autonomous new-style broker

Core features: 7/24 stock and private asset perpetual contract trading; unified margin account

Assets covered: cryptocurrencies, major US stocks (e.g., Tesla, Apple), private equity (e.g., OpenAI, SpaceX)

Technical foundation: Autonomous financial platform

Funding: Raised $15 million, with investors including Polychain Capital, Variant, Coinbase Ventures

Launch plan: Early access via invitation soon; full open scheduled for 2026; January to launch zero-fee trading

Founding team: Co-founder Kevin (surname not disclosed)

The realization of these features relies on a new execution and settlement tech stack built for continuous trading. Cascade claims its underlying infrastructure inherits core advantages from the past decade of crypto, especially DeFi—automation, transparency, and censorship resistance—and packages these into user-friendly products.

Foundational philosophy: From “human-driven” to “autonomous” finance

To truly grasp Cascade’s ambitions, one must understand the philosophical ideas articulated by its founders. They compare traditional finance to a “human-driven” car: despite increasing traffic rules and warning signs, human error risks remain. The 2008 subprime crisis and the 2022 LUNA/FTX chain of collapses exemplify how reliance on human intermediaries and subjective judgment can lead systems to break under pressure. Post-crisis, traditional responses have been to strengthen regulation and capital requirements, resulting in bloated systems and a “too big to fail” paradigm.

Meanwhile, Bitcoin and DeFi represent an alternative path—“autonomous finance”—like an “autopilot” system, governed by pre-set, code-enforced rules for risk management, settlement, and solvency. During the 2022 market turmoil, protocols like Compound, Aave, Uniswap experienced volatility and liquidations, but thanks to transparent, real-time on-chain mechanisms, they maintained solvency and continued operation without bankruptcy or taxpayer bailouts. This demonstrates the resilience of a “built-in safety” model secured by code.

Cascade embodies this philosophy. It is essentially a brokerage layer built on the AFP model, packaging DeFi protocols’ proven autonomous liquidation, transparent collateral management, and continuous settlement capabilities into compliant services for a broader retail audience. Its goal is not to replace traditional finance or DeFi but to serve as a next-generation interface connecting the two, making the “autonomous driving” financial experience accessible.

Market significance and potential challenges: blueprint or over-idealization?

Cascade’s emergence carries symbolic and practical significance. It marks the gradual infiltration of crypto-native market structures into mainstream consumer trading. A wave of startups argues that traditional financial pipelines designed for 9:30-16:00 trading hours and batch settlement are outdated, and that software and blockchain-based solutions can offer superior experiences. Cascade’s appearance could accelerate traditional brokerages’ modernization efforts.

However, the road is fraught with challenges. The primary obstacle is regulation. Offering 7/24 perpetual US stock contracts involves securities law, derivatives regulation, and more—obtaining compliant licenses across major jurisdictions (especially the US) will be a major test. Second, liquidity building is non-trivial. Creating an active market for non-standard assets like private equity perpetual contracts requires a strong network of market makers and sufficient initial user depth, demanding ongoing time and resource investment.

Furthermore, while its “autonomous finance” narrative is compelling, as a centralized service platform, Cascade remains a trust-based “intermediary.” Ensuring the security of its underlying tech stack, transparently managing collateral, and fulfilling obligations under extreme market conditions will be scrutinized. After all, financial history teaches us that any innovation, while improving efficiency, can also introduce new, poorly understood risks.

In any case, Cascade’s debut sketches a clear picture of the evolution of financial infrastructure: from reliance on manual, intermittent, opaque systems to code-driven, continuous, transparent autonomous systems. It may not succeed immediately, but its vision of “autonomous driving” finance is no longer science fiction but an ongoing, quiet revolution. For ordinary investors, a seamlessly interconnected asset universe and 24/7 trading may be closer than we think.