Bitcoin

Portal Ventures has raised $75 million for its pre-seed cryptocurrency fund.

Portal Ventures has closed its second fund, raising $75 million to invest in pre-seed Web3 startups.

The fund includes support from investors such as a16z’s Marc Andreessen and Chris Dixon, as well as contributions from funds of funds including Accolade Partners, Theta Capital and CrossLayer Capital.

The venture firm is based in New York City and claims to have invested in cryptocurrency startups even before a white paper or pitch deck was drafted. According to Crunchbase, its portfolio includes startups such as Plume Network, which offers real-world asset tokenization, and Arch, a cryptocurrency lending platform.

According to a Portal spokesperson, the fund focuses on Bitcoin programmability, decentralized infrastructure (DePIN), and maximum extractable value (MEV) business models, and only invests in one founder per category.

Over the past few months, several venture firms have announced efforts to raise new funds targeting blockchain-based startups. Last April, Paradigm sought to secure $850 million for a new fund. This is the company’s largest since a $2.5 billion fund in 2021. Paradigm’s most notable investments in this space include Coinbase, Fireblocks, Blast, Optimism, Uniswap, and FTX.

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Dragonfly Capital and Pantera Capital also announced new ventures. In April, Pantera sought $1 billion from investors for an “all-in-one” fund focused on a wide range of blockchain-based assets, and Dragonfly said in September it plans to raise $500 million for its fourth cryptocurrency fund. . -Start-up phase.

Early-stage financing remains resilient, with $2.4 billion raised across 478 deals in the third quarter of 2024, despite a 20% quarter-over-quarter decline in total investments. Angel, pre-seed and seed rounds accounted for 85% of the total capital poured into cryptocurrency startups during the period, according to data from Galaxy Research.

Capital and number of transactions for cryptocurrency startups. Source: Galaxy Studies

To date, venture capitalists have invested $8 billion in cryptocurrency startups, primarily early-stage activity, putting this year at a level that matches or slightly exceeds 2023’s total investments.

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