Blockchain Capital Raises $580 Million

Move aside AI, crypto is back!

For investors this year, AI has been the belle of the ball, hovering up what seems like any available dry capital post the FTX blow up. Nothing emphasized this more than when traditionally crypto-focused VCs began pivoting away from crypto to focus on AI.

But that seems to be changing as a slew of recent VC firms have announced major fundraises to continue to support the crypto ecosystem.

First we had Coinfund’s $158 million fundraise in July, which was shortly followed by Polychain Capital’s $200 million raise.

This week though, Blockchain Capital, one of the most prolific VCs in crypto, announced that it had raised $580 million for two separate funds.

The money will be split between a $380 million “early stage” fund that will invest in Seed and Series A rounds… and a $200 million “opportunity” fund that will invest in late stage fundraising.

Why It Matters

Since the collapse of FTX in late 2022, private financing for crypto deals has fallen off a cliff. According to Architect Partners, crypto private financing declined 75% in the first half of 2023 versus first half 2022.

This dearth has caused multiple projects (especially in the metaverse and NFT space) to shut down.

Now, many of these companies that have shut down were unneeded and simply byproducts of the 2022 hype cycle built off of the back of free government money, zero interest rates, and covid-induced YOLOing. But, for an industry as young as crypto, new capital is needed to rebuild and disrupt.

That’s why Blockchain Capital’s fundraise is such a big deal. It may just be a sign of more capital to come.