The investment won’t affect Enlivex’s clinical trials for its lead drug candidate, Allocetra, and will also bring Italy’s former prime minister, Matteo Renzi, to its board of directors.
Enlivex Therapeutics (ENLV), an Israel-based clinical-stage biotech firm, said it’s raising $212 million in a private placement to become the first publicly traded U.S. company to adopt a blockchain-based prediction markets token as its main treasury reserve asset.
The token, RAIN, powers a decentralized protocol built on the Arbitrum blockchain that allows users to create and trade predictions markets on real-world events using smart contracts.
As with other prediction markets, like Polymarket, traders on Rain can bet on topics ranging from elections to sports, with outcomes settled via oracles or AI-based tools. The platform also includes a deflationary “buyback and burn” mechanism aimed at curbing supply of the RAIN token.
Enlivex, which has a $22 million market cap on Nasdaq, plans to buy RAIN tokens with the majority of the funds raised and will use the asset as its core treasury holding. The firm said it sees the growing prediction markets space as a strategic growth area, citing recent investments in competitors like Polymarket and Kalshi by major institutions including the New York Stock Exchange’s parent company and Andreessen Horowitz.
At the same time, Enlivex will continue clinical trials for its lead drug candidate, Allocetra, a macrophage therapy for osteoarthritis, according to a press release shared with CoinDesk. The disease affects more than 30 million Americans and lacks treatments that halt joint damage, a gap Allocetra aims to address.
Matteo Renzi, Italy’s former prime minister, is expected to join Enlivex’s board following the deal’s close, set for Nov. 25. Last year, the company’s board of directors added bitcoin BTC$87,267.39 to its cash-management strategy, approving the purchase of up to $1 million in the cryptocurrency. It’s unclear how much, if any, BTC the company currently holds.
The transaction, priced at $1 per share, represents an 11.5% premium over Enlivex’s last trading price.
