Difference between revisions of "Polychain Capital"

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''RB: Yeah for sure — I mean you look at them leading a $60M round into [[Dfinity]], there’s not [[MANY|many]] crypto funds that are set up to do that.''
''RB: Yeah for sure — I mean you look at them leading a $60M round into [[Dfinity]], there’s not [[MANY|many]] crypto funds that are set up to do that.''


''FF: Or let alone have the conviction to do that. I think many crypto funds are actually very risk averse. They rely on social proof in making investments versus digging deeply into the code and understanding whether a project will work or not because there’s only so many people who are capable of doing that technical analysis. Polychain has the capabilities — they hire really, really smart research analysts to perform this analysis. Whereas most crypto funds are maybe one or two people who have nontechnical backgrounds and aren’t able to dig as deeply."''
''FF: Or let alone have the conviction to do that. I think [[MANY|many]] crypto funds are actually very risk averse. They rely on social proof in making investments versus digging deeply into the code and understanding whether a project will work or not because there’s only so many people who are capable of doing that technical analysis. Polychain has the capabilities — they hire really, really smart research analysts to perform this analysis. Whereas most crypto funds are maybe one or two people who have nontechnical backgrounds and aren’t able to dig as deeply."''


== Investments ==
== Investments ==
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*[[Paradigm]]. [https://www.coindesk.com/the-crypto-protocol-trying-to-unite-every-exchange-order-book Led] a $1M seed round for [[Paradigm Labs]] in 2018, but as of 3-2020 Paradigm Labs [https://www.coindesk.com/paradigm-labs-shuts-down-says-it-was-too-early-for-defi-boom has closed down].
*[[Paradigm]]. [https://www.coindesk.com/the-crypto-protocol-trying-to-unite-every-exchange-order-book Led] a $1M seed round for [[Paradigm Labs]] in 2018, but as of 3-2020 Paradigm Labs [https://www.coindesk.com/paradigm-labs-shuts-down-says-it-was-too-early-for-defi-boom has closed down].
* [[PolkaDot|Polkadot]]. [https://proofofwork.news/p/proof-of-work-79 From] [[Proof of Work (Mailing List)|Proof of Work]] #79 (19-11-2019):
* [[PolkaDot|Polkadot]]. [https://proofofwork.news/p/proof-of-work-79 From] [[Proof of Work (Mailing List)|Proof of Work]] #79 (19-11-2019):
<nowiki> </nowiki>"''New [[Polkadot]] Ecosystem Fund [https://polkadot.network/announcing-the-polkadot-ecosystem-fund/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=Polychain%20Cap%20Fund launched] by [[Web3 Foundation]] and Polychain Capital to support teams building Polkadot parachains."''
<nowiki> </nowiki>"''New [[Polkadot]] Ecosystem Fund [https://polkadot.network/announcing-the-polkadot-ecosystem-fund/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=Polychain%20Cap%20Fund launched] by [[Web3 Foundation]] and Polychain Capital to support teams building [[PolkaDot|Polkadot]] parachains."''
* Polychain [https://defiweekly.substack.com/p/investment-thesis-eth owns] (27-2-2020) 10% of Polkadot's [[on-chain governance]] [[tokens]]. They also [https://www.coindesk.com/polychain-web3-foundation-to-back-polkadot-projects-with-new-ecosystem-fund created] (10-2019) a fund to further Polkadot development, together with [[W3F]]. 
* Polychain [https://defiweekly.substack.com/p/investment-thesis-eth owns] (27-2-2020) 10% of Polkadot's [[on-chain governance]] [[tokens]]. They also [https://www.coindesk.com/polychain-web3-foundation-to-back-polkadot-projects-with-new-ecosystem-fund created] (10-2019) a fund to further Polkadot development, together with [[W3F]]. 
* Polymarket. [https://www.forbes.com/sites/rorymurray/2020/10/19/polymarket-raises-massive-4-million-round-from-polychain-naval-ravikant-other-notable-investors/#485567ffc62e Participated] in a $4M raise for [[Polymarket]] (19-10-2020).  
* Polymarket. [https://www.forbes.com/sites/rorymurray/2020/10/19/polymarket-raises-massive-4-million-round-from-polychain-naval-ravikant-other-notable-investors/#485567ffc62e Participated] in a $4M raise for [[Polymarket]] (19-10-2020).  
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*StakerDAO. [https://www.coindesk.com/theres-now-a-dao-for-deciding-which-blockchains-to-stake-on Invested] in [[StakerDAO]] (31-10-2019)
*StakerDAO. [https://www.coindesk.com/theres-now-a-dao-for-deciding-which-blockchains-to-stake-on Invested] in [[StakerDAO]] (31-10-2019)
* Terra. Is [https://terra.money/about one of the backers] (9-3-2020) of [[Terra (LUNA)|Terra]].  
* Terra. Is [https://terra.money/about one of the backers] (9-3-2020) of [[Terra (LUNA)|Terra]].  
*[[TokenTerminal]]; they mention this as one of their 'community members' ([https://tokenterminal.com/ 1-8-2022]), however, due to the nature of the ones named, we can assume these are investors.
* [[Yearn]]. Polychain Capital has [https://cryptoslate.com/ethereum-data-top-crypto-investor-polychain-has-accumulated-330-yearn-finance-yfi/ purportedly] acquired 329 [[YFI]]. [https://decrypt.co/47889/polychain-capital-invests-8-2-million-into-ethereum-token-yfi From] [[Decrypt]] (11-11-2020):  
* [[Yearn]]. Polychain Capital has [https://cryptoslate.com/ethereum-data-top-crypto-investor-polychain-has-accumulated-330-yearn-finance-yfi/ purportedly] acquired 329 [[YFI]]. [https://decrypt.co/47889/polychain-capital-invests-8-2-million-into-ethereum-token-yfi From] [[Decrypt]] (11-11-2020):  
"''Crypto fund Polychain Capital has picked up a further 141 YFI. The fund can now boast owning 1.6% of the entire supply, all purchased from the open market."''
"''Crypto fund Polychain Capital has picked up a further 141 YFI. The fund can now boast owning 1.6% of the entire supply, all purchased from the open market."''

Revision as of 02:50, 1 August 2022

Basics

  • Launched in September, 2016 with $5 million from 30 investors.
  • Crypto/blockchain hedge fund.
  • From this interview (17-12-2018) with Set's Felix:

"I think another interesting thing is that in crypto, money has tended to flock to the highest quality projects, right. There are a certain number of projects that have stellar founders or groundbreaking protocols and everyone is interested in those particular projects. And usually there’s so much interest that they end up increasing the size of their round to accommodate everybody. So there, maybe even if an investor started as a lead, other funds end up coming in and creating this party round setup.

I think one exception to that is Polychain — they have the AUM to confidently lead rounds, especially on the equity side of things. And they’re also set up to do equity, so I’ve been hearing that they’ve actually been kind of monopolizing all of the good equity deals because they’ll take up a majority of a round.

RB: Yeah for sure — I mean you look at them leading a $60M round into Dfinity, there’s not many crypto funds that are set up to do that.

FF: Or let alone have the conviction to do that. I think many crypto funds are actually very risk averse. They rely on social proof in making investments versus digging deeply into the code and understanding whether a project will work or not because there’s only so many people who are capable of doing that technical analysis. Polychain has the capabilities — they hire really, really smart research analysts to perform this analysis. Whereas most crypto funds are maybe one or two people who have nontechnical backgrounds and aren’t able to dig as deeply."

Investments

"New Polkadot Ecosystem Fund launched by Web3 Foundation and Polychain Capital to support teams building Polkadot parachains."

"Crypto fund Polychain Capital has picked up a further 141 YFI. The fund can now boast owning 1.6% of the entire supply, all purchased from the open market."

Team, Funding, Partners etc.

  • Carlson-Wee, Olaf; founder, used to be the first employee at Coinbase
  • Zurrer, Ryan; used to build renewable energy around the world and for the last couple of years is an angel investor in the crypto space.
  • Jacob Phillips
  • Niraj Pant

Funding

Partners