In a blog post that lays out a imaginative and prescient for crypto’s future, starting from a “new monetary system” to warnings about “opaque” AI, a16z crypto introduced a brand new $2.2 billion fund. That is the VC agency’s fifth fund and brings the overall raised so far to $9.8 billion, it says.
As well as, the fund also promoted its CTO, Eddy Lazzarin, to normal companion, bringing the GP investing group to 4 folks. Lazzarin joins Chris Dixon, Ali Yahya, and Man Wuollet. The fund has backed standout firms like Coinbase, Kalshi, and Solana Basis.
The timing of this information is a bit ironic, with crypto buying and selling in such a sluggish interval that Coinbase introduced on the identical day it was shedding 14% of its workforce. March was the slowest trading-volume month throughout crypto exchanges since November 2023, crypto knowledge and information web site CoinGecko reported.
VC investing in crypto startups has cooled, too, touchdown at practically $5 billion within the first quarter of 2026, in comparison with nearer to $6 billion within the year-ago quarter, reports DLNews, citing stats from crypto knowledge web site DefiLlama.
The a16z crypto companions acknowledge this. They describe how crypto highs attract funding and a fervor of startups, however that “we’re at a type of quieter moments now,” they write. Nonetheless, they insist that a lot of what will get constructed throughout a downtime “is often extra helpful than it regarded on the peak, and extra sturdy than it regarded on the trough.”
Scorching market or not, there may be VC cash on the market for blockchain-related startups that may woo VCs. The half founders should overcome is that among the greatest crypto VCs are actually being seduced by AI startups. That is an space swimming in rising valuations.
As an illustration, Paradigm, one of many greatest and most prestigious crypto funds, is reportedly engaged on elevating a recent $1.5 billion fund to broaden its thesis into robotics and AI, The Wall Road Journal reported in February. Plus, Y Combinator, which has cranked out many crypto and blockchain-related startups through the years, didn’t ask for any in its most up-to-date “Requests for Startups” list.
Earlier this week, former Andreessen Horowitz investor Katie Haun introduced that her crypto-focused agency, Haun, has additionally raised a brand new $1 billion fund and can proceed to take a position on this market. However she’s additionally on the lookout for AI agent tech because it intersects with crypto/blockchain and fintech.
The most recent a16z crypto fund won’t be lured away by hotter markets, a spokesperson tells TechCrunch, promising that it will likely be “devoted 100% to crypto entrepreneurs.”
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