KPMG is reviewing its research on venture capital funding after the company behind ‘the biggest deal’ in Scotland this summer was removed from its listings following enquiries by Daily Business.

DL Mining, described as a global cloud mining service platform headquartered in Stirling, reportedly raised £67.5 million ($90m) in the largest VC deal in Scotland during the July-September period.

This led to its inclusion in KPMG’s latest Venture Pulse report, published widely in other media, which hailed it as a sign of Scotland’s investment success.

But following a Daily Business investigation, Pitchbook, the research company used by KPMG, has failed to verify the “legitimacy” of the Series B funding supposedly raised by DL Mining.

Following our enquiries, the company has now been removed “temporarily” from the Pitchbook database.

Daily Business based its enquiries on wanting to know more about DL Mining, who is behind it and who provided the finance for the £67.5m “deal”. Our attention has been drawn to a number of social media postings cautioning investors.

At the time the was said to have been sealed it received no attention from the UK press. Two overseas news media, both Canadian, carried reports based on the press release issued by the company which referred to the source of funding as “multiple investment institutions”. The identity of these institutions was not disclosed. The reports provided a quote from the DL Mining CEO who was not named.

Various other news items about DL Mining, including one by the Reuters agency, refer to it as a global company based in Stirling. It is said to have six million users worldwide.

DL Mining states on its website that it is registered as DL Management Solutions.

That company is said to be based at 34 Glasgow Road, Stirling, which is listed by an estate agency as a residential property. It appears most of its operations are virtual and in worldwide locations.

It filed total exemption accounts at Companies House for the year to the end of March 2024 which show the only directors are David and Lynne Gray. There was one employee and in 2023 it had no employees. It had reserves of £208,069.

DL Mining posts regularly on X and Facebook, and these accounts are listed as being in London.

Daily Business sent a message to the source of the deal press release and tracked down an email address to someone said to be handling communications for the company. Neither responded.

Pitchbook is employed by KPMG to gather the Venture Pulse data. Following our requests for information Pitchbook undertook enquiries of its own but failed to get DL Mining to clarify details of the funding deal.

In a statement, it said: “The financing announced by DL Mining initially met our inclusion criteria based on details in the company’s press release and supporting information on its website.

“At the time, we had no grounds to disprove the transaction. While we understood that the nature of crypto platforms – often decentralised, with operations conducted through third parties or remunerated via digital assets – can make verification more complex, we take any questions around data accuracy seriously.

“Following inquiries about the legitimacy of the financing, we reached out to DL Mining directly for additional details. As the company did not provide further clarification, we have temporarily removed its profile from our platform pending further verification.”

A spokesperson for KPMG UK, said: “Pitchbook’s data forms the basis of KPMG’s Venture Pulse reports and we take its accuracy seriously. We’re now working with Pitchbook to review the report production process to ensure all future deals are fully verified.”