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Nansen

Nansen is a blockchain data analytics company that provides a platform for users to utilize tools and dashboards to gain access to in-depth, on-chain information. ^[1]

Overview

The platform was founded in 2019 by Alex Svanevik, Lars Bakke Krogvig, and Evgeny Medvedev, and it is named after Fridtjof Nansen, an explorer, scientist, diplomat, and humanitarian. They chose to name the company after Fridtjof as they believe he is the “human embodiment” of the company's core values of transparency, courage, curiosity, and speed. ^[1]^[2]

Nansen's main offering is its ability to surface signals in blockchain data, which is made possible by the platform's use of on-chain analysis and millions of labeled wallets. This allows traders to gain a deeper understanding of the crypto ecosystem and make real-time decisions based on the data that truly matters. The platform offers various features such as "Hot Contracts," "God mode," and "Smart alerts," that allow users to discover new opportunities, conduct due diligence, and stay informed of significant events and trends in crypto. ^[1]

"After years of working with blockchain data, we found that many of our clients wanted the same thing: to know more about the wallets that are transacting on-chain. So we started building Nansen in 2019 to address this need, and have quickly become a leading provider of data and analytics for Ethereum." - the team stated^[1]

Nansen also offers a user-friendly interface that allows traders to easily access and interact with their data through dashboards, APIs, or direct SQL queries. Overall, Nansen serves as a valuable tool for crypto traders, providing them with the insights and data they need to navigate the ever-evolving crypto market. ^[3]

History

On October 27, 2020, Nansen raised $1.2 million in a seed round led by Mechanism Capital and Skyfall Ventures. Additional organizations that invested include: Robot Ventures, Fabric Ventures, Sparq, Volt Capital, CTF Capital, and Blockrock Capital; and many individuals in the crypto space invested as well. ^[4]

On June 29, 2021, Nansen’s series A round led by Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), raised $12 million. Investors included: Skyfall Ventures, Coinbase Ventures, imToken Ventures, Mechanism Capital, QCP Capital, and many more individuals who participated in the first seed funding as well as new individuals. ^[5]

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On July 30th 2021, Nansen released their new website with the focus of improving the user interface, user experience and upgrading features. ^[6]

On December 16th 2021, Accel led Nansen’s series B funding round, raising a total of $75 million. Investors included: GIC, a16z, Tiger Global, SCB 10X, and other prominent venture capitals and angel investors. ^[7]
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On February 7, 2022, Nansen released a referral program, offering a free month of the current subscription plan for each successful referral. To refer friends users had to share their unique referral link and the referred friend will also receive an extended trial period based on the subscription plan they choose. ^[8]

On February 10, 2022, Nansen launched Nansen Hubs, a community hub that offers a workplace for members of the company. Team members at Nansen will be able to spend up to one month annually in five crypto-friendly cities with accommodation, flights, and office space covered. The first five Nansen Hubs are located in Singapore, Lisbon, Miami, London, and Bangkok, which cover the main time zones Nansen operates in. The goal is to optimize for Nansen team members and their work life, and over time the hubs will host events and create spaces for people to connect. ^[9]
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On May 24, 2022, launched a new initiative called “Submit Your Project”, which allows crypto projects to submit their relevant cryptocurrency wallet addresses to be tracked by Nansen. This was created with the aim of giving the project more visibility to Nansen's users and potential investors who are conducting research using Nansen and the labeled projects and addresses appear with the entity’s name instead of the default hexadecimal address. This information is reflected on various dashboards and allows projects to track their performance and drive traffic to their websites. ^[10]

In July 2024, Nansen launched the industry’s first Ether exchange-traded fund (ETF) analytics dashboard.
The free-to-use dashboard is designed to track the performance of the United States-based spot ETFs, offering a real-time overview of the most critical data for traders, such as an interactive ETF flow chart and total ETF issuer balances. ^[23]

We’re thrilled to launch our ETH ETF dashboard, showcasing how Nansen empowers investors with real-time insights. As the first of its kind, it provides crucial information on ETF flows, supporting informed decisions.”^[23]

In October 2024, Nansen launched support for the Solana blockchain. The offering provides advanced tools to track wallet movements, monitor token balances and explore Solana’s DeFi and non-fungible token (NFT) ecosystems. ^[22]

“The TL;DR is we’re adding Solana to Nansen. It’s been a long time coming, but we finally got there. We spent an insane amount of time to get this to production.” - Svanevik said to Cointelegraph^[22]

Nansen Buys StakeWithUs

In September 2024, Nansen bought the staking platform StakeWithUs for an undisclosed price as CEO Alex Svanevik looks to expand beyond data provision into offering investment services for institutions and retail traders. ^[21]

StakeWithUs, which is backed by the Singapore government's innovation project SGinnovate, provides staking across multiple blockchains. Following its integration, Nansen will offer non-custodial staking for over 20 assets, including SOL, SUI, OSMO and ATOM. ^[21]

"By enabling staking within Nansen, we are not only expanding our service offerings but also enhancing our support for the blockchain ecosystems we integrate with," Svanevik said in a statement.^[21]

Partnership

Google Cloud

On June 9th, 2022, Nansen, announced an extended collaboration with Google Cloud. This partnership was made to provide real-time access to high-quality market intelligence for Web3 investors by running Nansen's platform on Google Cloud's data services. With the help of Google Cloud, Nansen plans to accelerate the introduction of new product lines, expand globally, and establish itself as the definitive information "super app" for Web3.

This collaboration also allows Nansen to support 10 additional blockchains and provide insight into the Non-Fungible-Token (NFT) market. Additionally, Nansen will leverage Google Cloud's web and mobile application development platform to give investors an aggregated view of their portfolio across multiple Web3 native wallets, in order for investors to communicate with each other and engage in over-the-counter (OTC) trades on the Nansen platform. ^[11]

Bitcoin Layer

On November 11, 2024, Nansen announced a partnership with Bitlayer - an EVM-compatible BTC L2 network designed to boost scalability, speed, and flexibility within the Bitcoin environment. The partnership was set to bring advanced analytics to the Bitcoin Layer 2 ecosystem, enabling insights into transaction trends and project traction. ^[19]

“Our collaboration with Bitlayer is a testament to our commitment to empowering blockchain communities with actionable data. Following this collaboration, we aim to further drive adoption within the BTC L2 landscape.” – Alex Svanevik, CEO, Nansen

This partnership lays the groundwork for Nansen to support additional BTC L2 networks, fostering transparency and growth in the Bitcoin Layer 2 on-chain ecosystem. ^[19]

Scroll

On October 30, 2024, Nansen announced its collaboration with Scroll - a zero-knowledge rollup for Ethereum, to bring onchain data and analytics to the Scroll ecosystem. This collaboration aims to empower developers, investors, and the broader Scroll community with actionable insights, driving growth and unlocking new opportunities. ^[20]

"We're thrilled to join forces with Scroll, an innovative Layer 2 solution, to deliver top-tier onchain data and analytics to their ecosystem. By combining our analytics expertise with Scroll's scalability, we are equipping crypto teams and investors with the tools they need to dive deep into the Scroll ecosystem. This collaboration is a big step toward fostering innovation and transparency in the blockchain space." — Alex Svanevik, CEO of Nansen ^[20]

Chiliz

In March 2024, Nansen partnered with Chiliz - a Layer-1 blockchain for sports and entertainment, to provide onchain data and analytics to its ecosystem. This partnership is set to illuminate the growth and adoption of SportFi, empowering both existing users and crypto communities at large with a deeper understanding of onchain activity within the Chiliz ecosystem. ^[24]

Aptos Foundation

In January 2024, Nansen partnered with Aptos to provide "best-in-class onchain data and analytics" to the Aptos ecosystem. This partnership aims to empower developers, founders and users with crucial onchain insights, propelling their growth. ^[25]

“We’re excited to partner with Aptos, the leading Move-based blockchain, to deliver best-in-class onchain data and analytics to their ecosystem. This collaboration will empower investors and crypto teams to dive deep into the Aptos ecosystem. We’re excited to help create a winner in the future of finance.” - Alex Svanevik, CEO of Nansen^[25]

Data Analytic Mechanisms

Nansen's core data analytic mechanism is on-chain analysis, which consists of various metrics in relation to the price action of a given digital asset. This type of analysis is important as it helps investors to gain insight into overall market sentiment and make informed decisions.

Exchange Flows

Exchange flows is an example of on-chain analysis. Centralized exchanges are the banks of the crypto ecosystem where investors can exchange fiat for digital assets. Nansen tracks large inflows and outflows of assets on these exchanges, which can signal incoming sell pressure or investors taking self-custody of the asset and intending to hold it. This data can provide investors with insight into overall market sentiment. ^[12]

Whale watching

Another example of on-chain data analysis is referred to as "whale watching." Whales, or more prominent or exceptionally large players, are assumed to have more knowledge about the markets than retail traders. Nansen tracks these large investors and their transactions to gain insight into market sentiment. When these larger investors who have held for significant periods start to dump on the open market, investors can follow them towards the exit. ^[12]

Data Extraction and Processing

In order to effectively analyze blockchain data, it must first be extracted and processed into a readable format. Nansen utilizes the Ethereum ETL project, an open-source solution that allows for the conversion of blockchain data into formats such as CSV. As core team members of Ethereum ETL, Nansen leverages this tool to obtain on-chain data and present it in user-friendly dashboards. Additionally, users have the ability to query the data themselves using Google’s BigQuery. ^[13]

Wallet Labelling

To provide additional insight and clarity, Nansen has a feature that labels crypto wallet addresses. These digital wallets, each with a unique address, act as identifiers for transactions. By labeling these addresses, Nansen is able to track specific entities and their transactions, giving users the ability to understand the actions of certain players in the market. This added level of detail allows for a deeper understanding of market activity. ^[13]

Main Features on Nansen

The Nansen platform provides tools to discover new opportunities, conduct due diligence, and stay informed of market events in real-time. By leveraging on-chain data and visualizing it in dashboards, users can gain insight and make better investment decisions.

Hot Contracts

Nansen's "Hot Contracts" dashboard on the homepage gives an overview of high performance contracts, ranked by the number of smart money interacting with them. This includes all types of smart contracts such as NFTs, staking pools, liquidity pools, and tokens. Projects with a large number of smart money interacting with them are typically worth checking out and reading up on. Additionally, the "Hot NFTs" dashboard allows users to see the overall volume flow of NFTs and tokens, sorted by the amount of volume they've had in the last 24 hours, which can be used to discover new opportunities. ^[13]

God Mode

Once an opportunity has been discovered, users can dive deeper into the on-chain activity to get a fuller understanding of what's happening behind the scenes. The "Token God Mode" dashboard allows users to take a closer look at the balance changes of notable wallets holding a specific token, helping to decipher if the change was due to a single wallet or if it's possibly the start of a wider trend worth keeping an eye on. Other data include the number of unique addresses for tokens and the token seniority distribution which shows the breakdown of the duration that holders have held their tokens for. Similarly, the "NFT God Mode" dashboard allows users to check out the types of buyers buying the NFT over the past few days. Users can also view the "Hodlers" dashboard to get a view of the number of smart money holders over time and the percentage of addresses that only own 1 NFT from the project. ^[13]

Smart Alerts

Users can set up real-time notifications on certain events to make more informed investment decisions by knowing who and what transactions are happening on a blockchain as they happen. For example, if many funds start to load up on a particular token, it might be a good time to buy some. Or if an increase in the number of notable NFT holders start to sell NFTs of a particular project, it might be wise to reduce exposure. ^[13]

Products

Nansen 2

Nansen 2, currently in beta, caters to onchain investors, offering streamlined navigation and performance. The platform's interface allows users to search, explore, and filter onchain data with ease. Nansen 2 employs machine learning to curate real-time market data, aiming to ensure users receive relevant information on their homepage without unnecessary noise. ^[14]

Nansen 1

Nansen 1 provides a simplified tool for onchain analysis, empowering users to uncover insights and track onchain activities. The platform's real-time dashboards assist in identifying emerging opportunities on-chain, while also enabling users to follow and receive alerts on the activities of influential wallets, whales, and funds in the crypto space. Nansen 1 supports due diligence with in-depth metrics for tokens, NFTs, and wallets. ^[15]

Nansen Research

Nana Research is a data-driven crypto research portal, run by a team of researchers and writers who publish the pages on the platform. They cover all cryptocurrency and blockchain based information including, DeFi, Gaming & Metaverse, Infrastructure, Markets, NFTs. ^[16]

Nansen Portfolio

Nansen Portfolio serves as a comprehensive tracker for crypto holdings, supporting over 45 chains. Users can efficiently monitor wallet addresses or ENS names, enhancing transparency by consolidating exchange wallet addresses on major blockchains. Endorsed by sources like The Block and Cointelegraph, Nansen Portfolio provides a practical solution for crypto enthusiasts and investors. ^[17]

Nansen Query

Nansen Query serves as a tool for crypto teams, facilitating the execution of intricate queries to streamline workflows and extract strategic insights from onchain data. The platform provides versatile capabilities for different facets of the crypto landscape. ^[18]

Investment Analysis

Nansen Query aids investors in maximizing returns and managing risks by offering tools for discovery, due diligence, and defense. The platform's capabilities empower investors to make informed decisions based on comprehensive onchain data. ^[18]

Business Intelligence

For business intelligence purposes, Nansen Query enables users to understand their performance, benchmark against competitors, and make data-driven decisions across various business functions. ^[18]

Customer Intelligence and Ecosystem Growth

Additionally, the platform offers features for gaining visibility into customer behavior on-chain, devising strategies for tailored products and services, and fostering ecosystem growth by understanding member dynamics.^[18]

Data Insights and Coverage

Nansen Query distinguishes itself with unique datasets and comprehensive coverage of on-chain activities. Users can delve beyond traditional event, trade, or price data to understand user preferences, historical behaviors, and emerging trends. ^[18]

Reliable Data Processing

The platform processes a substantial amount of data daily, with a focus on reliability. Users, including prominent entities like OpenSea, benefit from Nansen Query's high-quality on-chain raw data, integrated into production data pipelines for various purposes, such as anomaly detection and market analysis. The platform is dedicated to removing noise and complexities, making it an integral part of the infrastructure for industry professionals and teams. ^[18]