MoonPay has acquired AI research startup Dawn Labs and launched a new autonomous trading platform called Dawn CLI, marking the latest step in the crypto payments company’s push to build AI-native financial infrastructure.
The acquisition brings Dawn Labs founder Neeraj Prasad and the company’s engineering team into MoonPay, where Prasad will serve as chief engineer of MoonPay Labs. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
The move reflects growing convergence between artificial intelligence, crypto infrastructure and prediction markets, one of the fastest-expanding segments in digital trading. Platforms such as Polymarket and Kalshi have attracted a surge of retail and professional traders using algorithmic signals, social media data and automated strategies to trade event-driven contracts, though the underlying tooling remains fragmented and technically complex.
MoonPay said Dawn CLI is intended to simplify that workflow by allowing users to describe trading strategies in plain English. The system then converts those instructions into executable trading code, conducts simulations and backtesting, surfaces market data and autonomously executes trades on supported venues.
The product is part of a broader wave of AI-agent development across fintech and crypto, where companies are increasingly experimenting with systems capable of executing financial tasks with limited human intervention. Rather than functioning as a chatbot-style assistant, Dawn CLI is positioned more as an operational trading layer capable of automating research, strategy generation and execution within a unified workflow.
Prasad founded Dawn Labs in 2025 after engineering and machine learning roles at Waymo, Microsoft, Citadel and Reservoir Labs. He studied computer science and engineering at MIT, where he conducted machine learning research in neuroscience labs. His technical background spans quantitative trading systems, deep learning infrastructure and autonomous systems engineering.
MoonPay CEO Ivan Soto-Wright said the acquisition aligns with the company’s broader effort to give AI agents direct access to financial systems and programmable transaction infrastructure.
Originally known primarily for crypto on-ramp and payments services, MoonPay has spent the last year expanding deeper into infrastructure products tied to AI and autonomous financial applications. Recent launches have included MoonPay CLI, AI-agent tooling secured with Ledger hardware signing and MoonAgents Card, a virtual Mastercard debit card that enables stablecoin spending directly from blockchain-based balances.
The company also introduced an Open Wallet Standard designed to make its infrastructure interoperable across multiple AI frameworks, wallets and blockchain networks. Dawn CLI extends that strategy by moving from payments and wallet access into autonomous trading and market participation.
The timing comes as venture-backed fintech and crypto firms increasingly compete to establish foundational infrastructure for AI-driven financial services. While many AI finance tools remain focused on analytics or conversational interfaces, companies are now racing to build systems capable of directly initiating transactions, allocating capital and executing strategies autonomously.
Prediction markets in particular have become an active testing ground for automated trading systems because they generate large volumes of real-time data tied to political events, macroeconomic indicators and cultural trends. Traders often combine social sentiment analysis with quantitative models to identify pricing inefficiencies across platforms.
MoonPay, founded in 2019, now says it serves more than 30 million customers across 180 countries and supports over 500 enterprise clients across crypto and fintech markets. The company provides infrastructure for crypto trading, payments, stablecoin settlement and fiat-to-digital asset conversion.