This is a segment from the Blockworks Daily newsletter. To read full editions, subscribe . Have markets been obsessing over the wrong Minsky? After Liberation Day, we seemed to be headed for a “Minsky moment” in which global investors suddenly lose faith in the US dollar, triggering the kind of market collapse that economist Hyman Minsky warned about. But after a big rally this week, the Nasdaq is back to within 1.4% of where it was before President Trump shocked the world with his “reciprocal” tariffs. 1.4% hardly seems like a disaster. Stocks may have recovered because the president seems to be having second thoughts on tariffs — especially after the CEOs of three major retailers warned that their shelves would soon be bare if the trade war doesn’t resolve itself more or less immediately. That may have prompted the president to tell Time magazine on Tuesday that President Xi had called him seeking a deal on tariffs. On Wednesday, Treasury Secretary Bessent also hinted at de-escalation, saying “there is an opportunity for a big deal” with China. But even an immediate deal, however big, might not come soon enough, according to Bloomberg’s Chief Economist Anna Wong. On this morning’s Odd Lotts podcast , Wong warned that, due to the long lead times in retail supply chains, “there’s a high probability that we’ll be seeing some empty shelves in the holiday season.” Also this morning, China clarified that trade talks with the US haven’t even begun — in fact, they’re not even talking about talking as of yet. The president seemed to disagree, telling a reporter , “They had a meeting this morning. It doesn’t matter who they is. We may reveal it later.” Maybe “they” did have a meeting, who knows. But none of this seems concrete enough to explain this week’s rally in equities. So perhaps something else is afoot? AI developments One concrete bit of news this week was the good earnings report from Alphabet, which CEO Sundar Pichai attributed to the company’s “full-stack approach to AI.” That’s only one quarter of earnings from one company (whose stock was only up small today). But it might serve as a timely reminder that what’s happening in AI right now is probably far more important than what’s happening with tariffs. To name just a few recent developments: An academic study found that large-language models like ChatGPT now pass the Turing Test; Tyler Cowen believes artificial general intelligence (AGI), by his definition, is here; AI-empowered robots are running marathons and working as cameramen ; and you can now buy your very own humanoid robot for less than the cost of a compact car. Most impressively, an AI startup announced that it’s made great strides towards a “generalized physical intelligence” that will give robots “the ability to figure out how to correctly perform even a simple task in a new setting or with new objects.” To get a sense for what that means, check out this video of a robot cleaning up houses it’s never been in before. All of this was anticipated by the father of artificial intelligence, Marvin Minsky (no relation to the economist Hyman Minsky). Marvin predicted way back in 1994 not only that robots would “inherit the earth” but also that they would do so peacefully — as our “children.” That’s looking more and more prescient. How good will the world be when the cost of a humanoid, house-cleaning robot gets so cheap that nearly everyone can afford one? That is a Minsky moment to look forward to — and it may be nigh. Future sight Let’s check the charts. Predictions are hard (especially about the future): Despite all the news this week, the Polymarket odds of a recession are about unchanged at 55%. But you can take your pick of predictions: Bank of America thinks the odds of a US recession are still only 35% ; Ed Yardeni sees a 45% of “stagflation/recession”; and Torston Slok sees a 90% chance of a “Voluntary Trade Reset Recession.” Own goal? New forecasts from the IMF suggest that the “supply shock” for the US (GDP down, inflation up) will be worse than the “demand shock” is for China (GDP down less, and inflation down, too). The supply shock is underway: A study of daily prices at retailers across the US finds that the price of goods from China rose immediately after the April 2nd announcement of tariffs and have continued to rise since. The price of goods from Mexico and Canada, however, have fallen (because of exemptions and chances of a trade deal, they think). As bad as the last guy? A Reuters/Ipsos poll out this week shows that President Trump’s approval rating on his handling of the economy is all the way down to, well, Joe-Biden levels. What is this? A Minsky moment for ants? As recently as a week ago, the biggest concern in markets was that foreign investors had lost faith in the US dollar and would therefore be selling all of their US assets. But TIC data shows that foreign selling of US equities has been “moderate.” Not much has happened — yet: “The softness in US soft data [eg, sentiment surveys] still has not spilled over to hard data,” Augur Infinity writes. “Based on our calculation, soft data is now implying a meaningful contraction, while hard data continues to indicate above-trend growth.” The canary in the Korean coal mine: Exports from South Korea to the US are considered a leading indicator for global GDP. In April, they fell 14% from the year before. Everything on hold? Citadel CEO Ken Griffin opined this week that, thanks to the tariff turmoil, the US “has devolved into a nonsensical place” where business leaders spend all their time worrying about supply chain disruptions. “People are not going to raise [money] to build manufacturing in America,” he added, “because with the policy volatility, you actually undermine the very goal you’re trying to achieve.” The above survey data on capex intentions suggests he’s right. Zooming out: The S&P 500 has outperformed gold by about 4,700% since 1980 — which makes the recent trend reversal seem a little less foreboding. The contrarian indicator: The “Magazine Cover Indicator” (which is real enough to have a Wikipedia entry ) was flashing green at the start of the week after the Economist ran an unprecedented fourth straight cover story that was bearish on the US and its currency. That’s probably the real reason stocks were up this week: When everyone’s worried about the same thing at the same time, it probably won’t turn out as bad as everyone thinks. So maybe we should get back to thinking about AI again — and hope it will be better than everyone thinks. Have a great weekend, Minsky-moment readers. Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters: Blockworks Daily : Unpacking crypto and the markets. Empire : Crypto news and analysis to start your day. Forward Guidance : The intersection of crypto, macro and policy. 0xResearch : Alpha directly in your inbox. Lightspeed : All things Solana. The Drop : Apps, games, memes and more. Supply Shock : Bitcoin, bitcoin, bitcoin.

2025-04-26 00:30

This is a segment from the Lightspeed newsletter. To read full editions, subscribe . One of the best parts of traveling is getting to meet new people, unless you’re traveling to a crypto conference. Solana Crossroads kicked off today in Istanbul, so a number of Solana builders decamped from New York and San Francisco to sip stale coffee halfway around the world while talking with the same people they see at Solana events in New York and San Francisco. Many attendees stopped by the Step Finance-sponsored community conference on their way to Dubai for TOKEN2049 next week before shipping off to New York City for Solana Accelerate in May. Crypto itself may still be struggling to find product-market fit, but crypto conferences seem to have inelastic demand. After a year of explosive growth for Solana, Crossroads attendees didn’t seem too concerned with other ecosystems. Some complained that the yearly Ethereum conference ETHDenver talked too much about Solana and other ecosystems. At Crossroads, it almost felt like those other smart contract ecosystems didn’t exist. Solana teams hawked their wares on the conference’s expo floor. I held a prototype of the Solana Seeker phone. It wasn’t production-ready, so all I could really do was look at a promotional display on the screen, but I can now vouch for the fact that its casing exists, at least. The internet filtering startup DoubleZero had some conference buzz. One Solana founder said market makers offered up their connection with the network as a way to pitch their services. I caught DoubleZero co-founder Austin Federa near the media room and asked him some vague question about the state of high-throughput blockchains. “Imagine if the sun disappeared,” he began before explaining the importance of being able to broadcast data. While Crossroads is filled with many of the usual suspects, a number of locals showed up as well. “I’ve been impressed with frankly just the number of local Turkish people who’ve shown up,” Framework Ventures partner Brandon Potts said. “A lot of the conversations with locals I’ve had are just practical ones around stablecoins and like, ‘Hey … which one should I hold?’” I chatted with a Turkish Solana developer who filled me in on the history of the land. He told me that coins were invented in Lydia, an ancient kingdom located in modern day Turkey. His father collects coins, he added. “You collect coins, too. Shitcoins,” his friend shot back. Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters: Blockworks Daily : Unpacking crypto and the markets. Empire : Crypto news and analysis to start your day. Forward Guidance : The intersection of crypto, macro and policy. 0xResearch : Alpha directly in your inbox. Lightspeed : All things Solana. The Drop : Apps, games, memes and more. Supply Shock : Bitcoin, bitcoin, bitcoin.

2025-04-25 23:30

This is a segment from the Forward Guidance newsletter. To read full editions, subscribe . While dozens of public companies currently hold bitcoin on their balance sheets, a world where thousands — yes, thousands — more follow suit is inevitable. At least according to panelists at Bitwise’s Bitcoin Standard Corporations Investor Day. “To everyone wearing an orange tie…It’s good to be on the team with you,” Strategy founder Michael Saylor told the Thursday event crowd. He then wanted the Pier 59 window shades lowered to prevent light from obfuscating his PowerPoint presentation. As if the bitcoin Gods heard him, they started coming down a moment later. It was Saylor’s typical spiel, one you might have heard before: Most asset classes don’t beat monetary inflation. Bitcoin allows an Uber driver in Nigeria to outperform the smartest money managers in NYC. It’s a better version of gold that he expects to hit $13 million a coin by 2045. Yada yada yada. Strategy owns 538,200 BTC. ( Here’s , in a nutshell, how they plan to keep buying.) “I don’t say this to brag, because the truth is the way we did it was so brainless,” Saylor said. “Everything that all these companies do is extremely complicated — we could not create NVIDIA chips or create iPhones. Every one of you could copy me.” But will they? Bitwise, in a Q1 report, put the number of public companies holding BTC at 79. Kraken CFO Stephanie Lemmerman made perhaps the most interesting prediction. She expects about 20% of the roughly 55,000 public companies to hold BTC a couple years from now. That’s a lot of companies. Like 11,000. A key piece of the nebulous “broader adoption” narrative you hear plenty about, companies jumping in can move prices while offering additional endorsements. Semler Scientific Chair Eric Semler noted how the medical tech provider — sitting on plenty of cash — was facing challenges within its core business. The company first bought BTC last year and now owns 3,303 BTC. While it took the old SEC months to approve Semler’s first at-the-market (ATM) offering to help it buy more bitcoin, Semler said, the new-look agency quickly greenlit its latest one . There are possibly “thousands” of what the executive called “zombie” companies in a similar situation that would benefit from a BTC treasury strategy, he added. Then there are those looking to go bigger. Twenty One Capital — a new entity backed by Tether and Softbank that is combining with Cantor Equity Partners — looks to launch with roughly 42,000 BTC. That would be behind only Strategy and bitcoin miner Marathon Digital. “There’re a lot of smaller-scale…bitcoin treasury companies, which have a role to play,” Cantor Fitzgerald’s Robert Harrington said. “But I think this market demands scale.” Once one of the Magnificent 7 companies starts buying BTC, many more will follow, panelists noted throughout the day. You might remember Microsoft shareholders rejected a related proposal in December. We know, of course, that bitcoin is volatile. An audience member asked what happens if BTC’s price falls below the price at which a company acquired it. Establishing “board alignment” that this is a long-term play is crucial, said Fold General Counsel Hailey Lennon. She added: “Unless the fundamentals of bitcoin change, the goal is not to sell.” Lemmerman noted too: “It’s not necessarily where you came in but where you expect [BTC] to be and what you’re forecasting.” Fundstrat Capital CIO Tom Lee argued, too, that there’s “a lot more to the [bitcoin] treasury story” than buying a speculative asset that can appreciate. It’s a new accounting standard of sorts — “the idea that you don’t have to have cash holdings only in the US dollar.” Put another way, Kinetics Mutual Funds co-founder Peter Doyle said BTC is an off-ramp to “playing financial Whack-a-Mole” as governments continue to print money. That’s why he said all companies will ultimately adopt bitcoin. Saylor “woke up” in 2020 when he realized what was happening to his cash and his business, Doyle noted. “They don’t feel that yet,” he added of others. “But they’re going to feel that.” Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters: Blockworks Daily : Unpacking crypto and the markets. Empire : Crypto news and analysis to start your day. Forward Guidance : The intersection of crypto, macro and policy. 0xResearch : Alpha directly in your inbox. Lightspeed : All things Solana. The Drop : Apps, games, memes and more. Supply Shock : Bitcoin, bitcoin, bitcoin.

2025-04-25 22:31

This is a segment from The Drop newsletter. To read full editions, subscribe . The period drama television series Peaky Blinders has been licensed for a blockchain game, Banijay Entertainment and crypto startup Anonymous Labs announced on Thursday. The game will have an in-game cryptocurrency and a mix of “interactive experiences” and action sequences, according to a blog post . The game will be set in the post-World War I era in Birmingham, England, like the show. The show follows the gang known as the Peaky Blinders and stars Irish actor Cillian Murphy. It aired from 2013 until 2022 on BBC networks and is streamable on Netflix. While the game’s title and further details have not yet been revealed, the game is slated to launch in 2026. Anonymous Labs is trying to bring “Web2” IP into crypto. It previously launched a token for the animated character and comic book cat Simon’s Cat, but that token is down 89% from its all-time high four months ago. David Christopher, group director of licensing and merchandising at Banijay Rights, brokered the Peaky Blinders crypto game deal. Banijay Rights acquired Peaky Blinders’ production company, Caryn Mandabach Productions Limited, last year. Banijay previously struck Peaky Blinders deals with CMPL in 2022 before ultimately acquiring the company. This won’t be the first time the world of Peaky Blinders has appeared in a game, though. In 2023, narrative VR game Peaky Blinders: The King’s Ransom released to mixed reviews on Steam and didn’t grab much attention. Peaky Blinders: Mastermind is a puzzle game that was released in 2020 and got better reviews (and more of them), but it was ultimately discontinued on Steam in late 2022. More recently, Banijay facilitated a deal for Peaky Blinders with the (non-crypto) MMO World of Tanks. Themed characters and a special tank were available in-game as part of a unique battle pass season from March 20 until March 31 last month. There have been a handful of traditional media licensing plays in the crypto gaming space lately — though most have been with older IPs that are not as known among contemporary Western gaming audiences. SEGA has licensed Code of Joker and Sangokushi Taisen for different crypto games, and Ubisoft has built one based on its retro Might and Magic game franchise for Immutable. In years past, Hollywood studios like Warner Bros. have explored crypto plays, but none have made a major splash with audiences. Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters: Blockworks Daily : Unpacking crypto and the markets. Empire : Crypto news and analysis to start your day. Forward Guidance : The intersection of crypto, macro and policy. 0xResearch : Alpha directly in your inbox. Lightspeed : All things Solana. The Drop : Apps, games, memes and more. Supply Shock : Bitcoin, bitcoin, bitcoin.

2025-04-25 20:30

This is a segment from the 0xResearch newsletter. To read full editions, subscribe . When you see pro-crypto people declaring on Twitter that “blockchains will replace TradFi,” what that specifically means is the disruption of the DTCC (Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation) as the canonical post-trade clearing and settlement house for US securities markets. The DTCC is owned by a consortium of the world’s biggest banks. The company has a monopoly on securities settlement, clearing something like $9 trillion to $11 trillion in value daily. The idea that the DTCC would use a blockchain would’ve been laughable just several years ago. It was expected that the incumbents would be too slow or too skeptical of the tech to adapt. Well, not anymore. The Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC) announced earlier this month that it was creating a new platform, “Collateral AppChain,” for “tokenized real-time collateral management.” The Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC) Announces New Platform For Tokenised Collateral Management Umm, this is kind of a big deal. — ◢ J◎e McCann 🧊 (@joemccann) April 2, 2025 In the DTCC’s “Great Collateral Experiment” hands-on demo, they explained how its Collateral Appchain could be used to mobilize treasuries, equities, tokenized money market funds and even cryptoassets globally in real time – free of settlement or liquidity constraints. You can watch it here for yourself. It reminded me of some of the earliest “enterprise blockchain” efforts like JPMorgan demoing Quorum back in 2016. Except this time, it’s more than a proof of concept. The DTCC team demonstrated how its Collateral Appchain would improve upon its antiquated T+X settlement processes to a real-time model where firms no longer face liquidity bottlenecks due to constraints around market hours or needing to hold extra collateral as a buffer while waiting for settlement. Translation: We recognize the merits of blockchains, we are updating our outdated technology to blockchain rails, and you don’t have to use Ethereum. Or, as Galaxy Research’s Thad Pinakiewicz notes : “The DTCC is trying to avoid having their position usurped by co-opting the only tech that can feasibly threaten them.” But what does this mean for crypto? It’s not so surprising that the DTCC has come around to blockchain technology. Many financial institutions are already embracing the tech. What is surprising is that the DTCC has proven a lot more nimble than crypto-natives would’ve expected. Should the DTCC’s Collateral Appchain come into reality quickly, it does bring into question the remaining value proposition of public blockchains. Yes, the DTCC’s Appchain validator set is probably going to be centralized. Assets are still going to remain in traditional custodial systems to remain regulatory-compliant. It’s built on the Hyperledger Besu Ethereum client, so it’s likely going to be a permissioned system and non-composable with DeFi. But the DTCC Appchain will have other crucial advantages. The DTCC Appchain will be unencumbered by the complexities and costs that public blockchains require to facilitate onchain securities trading. The Appchain will also have the liquidity to enable trillions in daily trading that public blockchains do not currently possess. There’s a reason why the DTCC has stuck to its suboptimal T+1 netting settlement process , and that reason is because it’s more efficient than having to process every transaction like a public blockchain does. What does that mean for crypto-native efforts (such as Ethena’s Converge chain) who have been building a similar settlement layer for TradFi clients? Guy Young, founder of Ethena, believes the DTCC’s developments are a “strong validation” of its Converge chain thesis. “However, these purpose-built settlement layers for TradFi need real products or assets to be delivered alongside the infrastructure otherwise it will be just more empty blockspace. This is where Ethena and Securitize are uniquely positioned to provide our existing 10b+ AUM asset base and product set to these pools of capital.” Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters: Blockworks Daily : Unpacking crypto and the markets. Empire : Crypto news and analysis to start your day. Forward Guidance : The intersection of crypto, macro and policy. 0xResearch : Alpha directly in your inbox. Lightspeed : All things Solana. The Drop : Apps, games, memes and more. Supply Shock : Bitcoin, bitcoin, bitcoin.

2025-04-25 20:00

This is a segment from the Supply Shock newsletter. To read full editions, subscribe . Imagine being in an industry where a yellow piece of paper is one of your most iconic symbols. Well, that’s Bitcoin, and today’s legend is none other than Christian Langalis, better known as Bitcoin Sign Guy. Langalis is the young man in a suit who held up a sign that read “Buy ₿itcoin” while Janet Yellen, then-Chair of the Federal Reserve, stood her ground in front of Congress in 2017. Today’s story is about much more than just his viral moment, however. Before he became a meme, Christian was just another 25-year-old working at a global macro fund. But he wasn’t your typical Wall Street junior analyst. He was the “young Bitcoin kid.” A man that nobody took seriously when he talked about cryptocurrency. For Langalis, being dismissed had an unexpected effect. Instead of discouraging him, it opened his eyes to something crucial: The markets weren’t what they seemed. They were, in his view, artificial constructs propped up by central bank policies. So he did what any self-respecting skeptic would do. He started buying bitcoin. And like many bitcoiners before and after him, Christian didn’t just buy bitcoin; he wanted to understand the system he was rebelling against. What do you do when you realize the world is only serving the interest of the few? You dive into alternative economics. 3/ Christian became a fierce Libertarian He started reading everything he could about Austrian economics He read the classics by Schumpeter and Rothbard 😍 pic.twitter.com/jnhrFZZvh7 — The Bitcoin Historian (@pete_rizzo_) April 20, 2025 Nowadays, Keynesians rule the world, at the behest of the late John Maynard Keynes. But others are becoming favorites again, with Schumpeter, Rothbard and Mises staging a comeback. These authors had a deep effect on Langalis, and they pushed him into the Cato Institute, a world-renowned libertarian think tank. Under the guidance of George Selgin, one of the world’s utmost authorities on money, Christian began developing his own economic thesis on Bitcoin. But he wasn’t content just to profit from bitcoin — he wanted to understand its potential to reshape the financial world. Stage set Then came July 2017. Christian was asked to attend the annual Federal Reserve report to Congress. As Janet Yellen droned on about monetary policy, a bored Christian had an idea. He grabbed his notepad and wrote two simple words: “Buy ₿itcoin.” The price was $2,300 at the time, and bitcoin was in the midst of an epic run that would eventually take it to $20,000. Christian figured he’d flash the sign and maybe grab a screenshot later. For the LOLs. He had no idea he was about to create a moment that would define Bitcoin culture. With the price now ~$93,200 per coin, everyone who listened is up almost 4,000%. 5/ There, Christian was asked to attend the Fed report to Congress Bored, Christian decided to write "Buy Bitcoin" on his notepad He figured he'd flash the sign, then collect the screenshot later… pic.twitter.com/cynSy9UADg — The Bitcoin Historian (@pete_rizzo_) April 20, 2025 Within seconds, security descended. Christian was escorted out of the hearing. You can actually see him being removed on the livestream. But by then, it was too late. We can safely call it the Bitcoin photobomb seen around the world. Aftermath The Bitcoin community’s response was immediate and overwhelming. Christian received over 7 BTC ($16,100 then, $650,000 now) in donations from supporters who appreciated his bold statement. Overnight, he had become an icon. Instead of getting drunk with fame, Christian’s conviction only deepened — luckily! He later revealed he was holding 99% of his net worth in bitcoin, and declared he “won’t be converting it back into US dollars.” Did someone say skin in the game? In the years following his famous stunt, Christian has used his newfound celebrity for good. He’s appeared at numerous events, always in his trademark suit and tie, raising money for organizations like Coin Center, a non-profit that helps defend Bitcoin’s interests in Washington DC. Years later, he called it a “new financial substrate” and predicted that one BTC will eventually be worth over $1 million. 10/ In the years to follow, Christian used his celebrity to raise money for charities Here he is with his trademark suit and tie, raising money for Coin Center The non-profit helps defend Bitcoin in D.C. ✊ pic.twitter.com/IMM9OfFF0S — The Bitcoin Historian (@pete_rizzo_) April 20, 2025 But Langalis isn’t like most of you talking heads. He’s also building. Christian has founded a new Lightning startup that’s currently in stealth mode, working to advance the Bitcoin economy he believes in. In a fitting twist of fate, Christian recently auctioned off the original “Buy ₿itcoin” sign for over $1 million. The piece of paper that once photobombed the Federal Reserve Chair had become a piece of Bitcoin history. The Legacy Christian Langalis’s story is more than just a tale of a viral moment. It’s about having the courage to challenge the status quo, even when nobody takes you seriously, in the status quo’s arena. It’s about understanding that sometimes, the simplest actions can have the biggest impact. All things that made him CoinDesk’s Most Influential person in Bitcoin in 2017. For those who bought bitcoin when Christian held up his sign, the returns have been spectacular. But perhaps the real value of his gesture wasn’t in the investment advice, but in the message it sent: that Bitcoin represents a peaceful revolution against the traditional financial system. Have a great weekend, And remember, sometimes the best investment advice comes on a piece of paper held up behind a Fed chair. Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters: Blockworks Daily : Unpacking crypto and the markets. Empire : Crypto news and analysis to start your day. Forward Guidance : The intersection of crypto, macro and policy. 0xResearch : Alpha directly in your inbox. Lightspeed : All things Solana. The Drop : Apps, games, memes and more. Supply Shock : Bitcoin, bitcoin, bitcoin.

2025-04-25 19:30

This is a segment from the Empire newsletter. To read full editions, subscribe . “I’m always trying to figure out where the puck is going,” Pantera’s Paul Veradittakit told me. It’s a key part of how Veradittakit determines whether or not he’s interested in investing time and, of course, money into a project. Veradittakit’s been around the industry for over a decade. If he hadn’t joined Pantera, he might have been one of the first employees at Coinbase. Instead, he and Pantera founder Dan Morehead decided to invest in companies that were building like Coinbase in other parts of the world. Veradittakit said Pantera’s invested in 22 unicorns, with him taking the lead on 17 of them. He’s now focused on finding the next winners of this cycle, especially since times have changed and, well, you know the rest. His bread and butter is Series A rounds, which are when a firm raises significant capital for the first time. Veradittakit said there’s a bit of flexibility in a seed round, but that isn’t the case for a Series A. In order to put money behind a firm, he’d need to see it as a billion-dollar company, and his focus is on hunting for those future unicorns. “While a founder is great, I’m looking for someone who will not stop until they succeed. Someone hungry, someone who won’t take no for an answer, will continue to find answers to problems,” he told me. Bonus points if they’re constantly information-seeking. “The other thing that I look at is if the company already has a product. Then I want to see that the product is something that clients and customers love…It’s even better if we’re able to use the product ourselves; then we could even provide a lot of value just from us being an investor.” Fund V Pantera is in the middle of raising for its next big fund: Pantera Fund V. “Our last fund was $1.25 billion; this fund is targeted to be a billion…Quite a bit of interest from existing investors and new investors…We’re excited because there are a lot of companies right now that are hitting their stride,” he explained. “We are a multi-stage firm, so we can now see companies…getting to Series B and beyond… We’re starting to see protocols that are finding product market fit that we can buy off of treasuries, and so there’s a lot of opportunity, especially [as] capital markets that are opening up, the IPO markets, we could be investing in those types of companies.” For Veradittakit, perhaps the most exciting factor is that the friendlier US environment has encouraged founders and developers to build on American soil. Forty percent of Pantera’s capital has gone to projects outside of the US in the past, and Veradittakit is optimistic they’ll balance that out with the inclusion of more US-based companies. VC Coins One topic I wanted to get Veradittakit’s take on: the critiques of VC coins, or projects that give venture capitalists large allocations. Veradittakit understands where the frustration comes from, noting that in 2017-2018, “a lot of investors made a lot of money, and then retail got rugpulled.” Those events are probably cyclical, happening when the market’s hot, he added. “I think having vesting schedules and more alignment between VCs and entrepreneurs in terms of building for the long term is very important…Having more transparency around investing schedules and all of that is also going to be important for retail, so that they know what they’re getting themselves into, right? You only feel bad when you feel like you’re getting blindsided,” he told me. As the industry matures, Veradittakit believes we’re going to see more projects go from having a very small team from the get-go and taking on more of a startup feel with executives and, for example, a business development team. Pantera, he added, aims to help projects that it invests in (obviously, they’re going to want said projects to succeed), with a focus on hiring, tokenomics and governance. What’s next Veradittakit and I also hit on what interests him and, perhaps more importantly, what doesn’t these days. In conversation, he highlighted staking, insurance and infrastructure plays (though not L1s), and also “things that make moving assets and providing security and insurance across a multi-chain world [easier], and [which make] it very easy for developers to provide the best user experience.” Then, of course, projects at the intersection of TradFi and crypto — including stablecoins, RWAs, tokenized stocks, etc. And, finally, consumers. “Especially with consumer companies now feeling more comfortable to launch a token, I think we can really start seeing consumer-facing products get traction and have participation from the users, whether it’s in the US and beyond.” Which, he believes, will benefit DeFi, gaming, consumer finance and DePIN. However, Pantera’s still not very exposed to hardware. “It’s just a very capital-intensive business. There would have to be…a seed-stage company and something that was just so cutting edge that we couldn’t pass [it] up,” Veradittakit told me. Pantera has also undertaken some AI investments, but they’re sidelining AI for the most part to see how the tech plays out. Veradittakit assured me it didn’t impact his belief that tokens could be used as AI incentives and AI agents which, in his view, could represent a “killer use case” for crypto. Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters: Blockworks Daily : Unpacking crypto and the markets. Empire : Crypto news and analysis to start your day. Forward Guidance : The intersection of crypto, macro and policy. 0xResearch : Alpha directly in your inbox. Lightspeed : All things Solana. The Drop : Apps, games, memes and more. Supply Shock : Bitcoin, bitcoin, bitcoin.

2025-04-25 16:36

This is a segment from the Lightspeed newsletter. To read full editions, subscribe . The Solana Foundation is tightening its leash on the validators receiving its stake. The Solana Foundation now says that for every new validator added to the Solana Foundation Delegation Program, it will remove three long-standing ones with under 1,000 SOL in external stake. The goal: have fewer validators relying on foundation stake and more earning authentic backing from the community. Blockworks Research data lead Dan Smith estimated that at current staking levels, around 150 Solana validators would lose their foundation stake under the new rule. The Solana Foundation has a sizable stash of SOL tokens, and it stakes some of those tokens with smaller validators. Those validators who go through KYC checks and enlist in the program also have some of their voting costs covered for a year. The program has booted participants before: In June 2024, it cut a group of validators found to have been operating private mempools, which can be used for sandwich attacks. This all may sound like inside baseball, but the delegation program is pretty central to Solana’s validator landscape. Last year, a report from Solana infrastructure shop Helius found 72% of validators receive foundation stake. Solana validators earn revenue partly through inflation, priority fees, and MEV, which all scale as validators attract more delegated stake. In other words, finding lots of stake is the whole ballgame for validators. By booting validators from the delegation program, the Solana Foundation is forcing validators to either find new sources of stake or potentially go out of business. The SFDP is a good program for bootstrapping a bigger validator set, but the Solana Foundation keeping some validators afloat obviously can’t last forever. It’s probably healthy for Solana to discourage freeloading. Still, count this as one of a continuing string of woes for smaller Solana validators . First a drawdown in market activity, now this, then maybe a cut to Solana’s emissions rate down the road. Jeffrey Albus contributed reporting. Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters: Blockworks Daily : Unpacking crypto and the markets. Empire : Crypto news and analysis to start your day. Forward Guidance : The intersection of crypto, macro and policy. 0xResearch : Alpha directly in your inbox. Lightspeed : All things Solana. The Drop : Apps, games, memes and more. Supply Shock : Bitcoin, bitcoin, bitcoin.

2025-04-25 16:00