Worldcoin Raises $135M, Targets 180M U.S. Verifications

Worldcoin, the biometric identity token project co-founded by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, raised $135 million in a direct, market-priced sale of WLD tokens with no lock-up, led by Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and Bain Capital Crypto. The funding announcement triggered a surge in WLD's price to a three-month high and pushed daily trading volume above $1 billion. The capital will support the expansion of Worldcoin’s iris-scanning Orb devices in the U.S., with a target of providing AI-proof human verification to up to 180 million Americans by year-end. Worldcoin has surpassed 26 million users globally and issued 12.5 million Orb-verified IDs. Additional investors in this and previous rounds include Selini Capital, Mirana Ventures, and Arctic Digital. The project is expanding in both the U.S. and select international markets despite ongoing regulatory scrutiny regarding privacy and data handling.