Thanks to inflation, $1 billion doesn't go as far as it used to, especially in a crypto economy where $100 million raises occur with yawning regularity. Better, then, to collect $1.3 billion and keep going for more.
Pantera Capital, a venture capital firm focused on the crypto space, announced during an investor call today that it has raised $1.3 billion for its Blockchain Fund, which will invest in Web3 startups, early-stage tokens and digital tokens with established liquidity levels.
It's not planning on holding onto that cash for long. Pantera plans on spinning up a sequel to the Blockchain Fund in 2023 and then exploring a growth-stage fund in 2024.
Pantera works by taking investor money, allocating it toward projects it finds promising, and delivering returns to investors in exchange for fees. Pantera's initial goal for this fund, launched in June of last year, was $600 million. It joins four other funds: Venture, Bitcoin, Early-Stage Token, and Liquid Token. The firm is also planning a $200 million Select Fund, to be focused on "more mature, revenue-generating companies than our typical Seed and Series A venture investments."
Despite this week's crypto price correction—which shaved 15% off of both Bitcoin and Ethereum in seven days—spending among Web3 venture capital firms remains heavy. In the past week, NEAR Protocol took in $350 million, Binance US gathered $200 million to build out the exchange, and NFT firm Genies reportedly raised $150 million. That doesn't include, of course, any of the smaller seed deals for the dozens of crypto companies popping up every day.
To make these levels of funding possible, crypto-centric VC firms have been building their war chests. Kathryn Haun, formerly a general partner at Andreessen Horowitz, last month announced she had raised $1.5 billion for her Haun Ventures to invest in early-stage and growing Web3 ventures. Last June, Andreessen Horowitz itself collected $2.2 billion for its Crypto Fund III. In November, Paradigm, led by Matt Huang and Coinbase co-founder Fred Ehrsam, upped the ante by announcing a $2.5 billion fund. And FTX ventures has $2 billion to play with for its own Web3 fund.