Investment firm Paradigm has launched a $2.5 billion venture fund to invest in the next generation of crypto companies and protocols. The firm believes that the “new fund and its size are reflective of crypto being the most exciting frontier in technology.”
$2.5 Billion Fund for Crypto Industry
Investment firm Paradigm announced Monday the launch of a $2.5 billion venture fund to invest in the next generation of crypto companies and protocols. Matt Huang and Fred Ehrsam, who co-founded Paradigm in 2018, explained:
Our conviction in these beliefs has only strengthened over the past three years, and we are pleased to announce a new $2.5 billion venture fund to continue investing in the next generation of crypto companies and protocols.
“This new fund will invest alongside our existing flagship fund across all stages and geographies,” they noted.
Ehrsam also co-founded the Nasdaq-listed crypto exchange Coinbase. Huang was previously a partner at Sequoia Capital focusing on early-stage venture investments including leading the firm’s cryptocurrency efforts.
The two co-founders finished raising $2.5 billion this month for Paradigm One, their first venture capital fund. The fund raised was twice the amount they initially targeted, the Financial Times reported. Nonetheless, Ehrsam told the publication, “It is probably small relative to where we’re going in 10 years.”
This is the largest new venture capital fund in history for the crypto space, the publication noted. Earlier this year, VC firm Andreessen Horowitz raised $2.2 billion for its new cryptocurrency fund, which at the time it said was the “largest crypto fund ever raised.”
Paradigm’s first fund, which is structured like a hedge fund, raised an initial $400 million in 2018. Its annual internal rate of return was more than 200% through the first half of this year, according to figures viewed by the Financial Times. The fund’s assets have reached as high as $10 billion.
Ehrsam and Huang further detailed:
This new fund and its size are reflective of crypto being the most exciting frontier in technology. Over the past decade, crypto has come a long way.
However, they emphasized, “The journey is just beginning, and the potential of crypto has never been more clear.”
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