Verafin’s record-breaking venture capital deal showed up big-time in the most recent quarterly data report by the Canadian Venture Capital and Private Equity Association.

The CVCA’s third-quarter data shows that Atlantic Canadian companies raised $532 million in venture capital in the third quarter, almost all of it attributable to Verafin’s $515 million equity and debt deal reported in September. Though there were questions about how the deal should be valued as there were equity and debt components, the CVCA decided to classify the whole raise as venture finance and booked it as the full $515 million.

Given that the Verafin deal was the largest VC raise in Canadian history, it was obviously the biggest Canadian deal in the third quarter. But it was not the only mega-deal in the three months to Sept. 30. The CVCA said 23 deals of more than $50 million each were the main reason Canada reported its best quarter for VC investment in six years.

“A staggering $2.4 billion was invested over 126 deals in the third quarter this year, the highest amount since 2013 and 79 percent higher than the previous high watermark of $1.3 billion invested in the previous quarter,” said the report.

Verafin, whose software helps financial institutions fight fraud and money laundering, said in September it received new equity financing from previous investors Spectrum Equity and Information Venture Partners, as well as new backers Northleaf Capital Partners, BDC Capital and Teralys Capital. Senior debt financing for the transaction was led by Wells Fargo Capital Finance and included Scotiabank in the syndicate. The company did not break down the equity and debt components.

With that deal, the VC funding in Atlantic Canada for the year to date looks like this:

(The CVCA reveals the year-to-date figures in its quarterly report, so we subtracted first-half data to come up with the third-quarter stats.)

The bad news is that two funding deals account for 93 percent of the Atlantic Canadian venture capital funding so far this year. In June, Halifax-based ABK Biomedical announced it had raised US$30 million ($40 million), led by Cambridge, Mass.-based F-Prime Capital, which is an offshoot of mutual fund giant Fidelity Investments; and Palo Alto, Calif.-based Varian Medical Systems, a maker of medical software.

Other than those two financing rounds, Atlantic Canada innovation companies have raised about $42 million for the first nine months of 2019, with just a few deals worth more than $1 million.

For the third quarter, the CVCA recorded five deals worth $9 million in New Brunswick and four deals worth $5 million in Nova Scotia.

It also said Halifax has been the fifth busiest city in Canada so far this year for VC investments, with 14 deals worth $43 million. Fredericton was eighth with eight deals worth $9 million.

Other than the Verafin deal, the big news in East Coast venture capital in the past few months was that Build Ventures had refilled the tank. The regional VC fund announced the $50.5 million initial close of its second fund, which it hopes will eventually be worth $65 million. Build also led the $2.9 million investment in Saint John-based Gemba Software Solutions, one of the larger raises in the region this year.