Deep Ventures

We just published the Deep Ventures Oct newsletter! We cover: - Portco updates for @yanez__ai, @numbersprotocol, and @downbaddotxyz - Market update - are institutions taking a step back? And is privacy making a comeback? - Lots of events and panels - More! Let us know what you think! blog.deepventures.io/p/deep-venture…

I'll be speaking at the Global Blockchain Congress @AgoraGBC in Dubai next week! Register here: bit.ly/15th-GBC Swing by and say hello if you're around!

We just published the @DeepVenturesVC August newsletter! We highlight: - A deep dive into why we invested in @yanez__ai - Syndicate portco updates on @ExaProtocol, @DemetherDeFi, and @bitflow - The latest industry update (all about stables and DATs) - Mik and Mike Crypto Show eps with @mikhailweb3_ Link in next tweet. Check it out and let me know what you think!

A crypto project hit a $6B valuation. Six months later the founder walked away. In this week’s episode with @mikewchan from @DeepVenturesVC we broke down what happened with this project, why many keep getting burned, and how incentives drive behavior in web3. We also covered Stripe and Circle launching their own chains, and the latest funding trends in stablecoins and AI. Curious to hear your takes! Link in the comments below.

Happy Friday! Here are the 5 most interesting crypto fundraises for the week ending 8/15/25: 1) USD AI GPU-backed stablecoin lending protocol @USDai_Official raised $13.4M in a Series A round led by Framework Ventures, with participation from Dragonfly Capital, Arbitrum Foundation, Flowdesk, and others. USD AI enables AI companies to obtain loans by using GPU hardware as on-chain collateral! Their model includes the USDai stablecoin and sUSDai yield-bearing token, providing a super cool convergence of stables and AI! 2) Ark of Panda AI-powered gaming metaverse @ArkOfPanda raised $4.5M in a funding round from Ember Labs, Vortex Capital, CoreX Venture, and others. Built on BNB chain, their AI-powered virtual reality metaverse platform that combines GameFi, NFTs, and user-generated content, enabling users to tokenize real-world assets and create personalized 3D digital experiences. 3) Transak Web3 payments infrastructure @Transak raised $16M in a Strategic round led by IDG Capital and Tether, with participation from Primal Capital, 1kx, and others. Transak provides a comprehensive fiat-to-crypto onramp platform with real-time liquidity routing, virtual bank accounts, and full compliance tools Transak’s platform has processed more than $2 billion in transactions and supports both retail and institutional users. 4) Hyperbeat Hyperliquid DeFi protocol @hyperbeat raised $5.2M in a Seed funding round led by EtherFi Ventures and Electric Capital, with participation from Coinbase Ventures, Chapter One, and many others. Hyperbeat is a permissionless DeFi yield infrastructure layer, offering products like liquid staking tokens, high-yield vaults, and decentralized credit. The Hyperliquid eco is growing fast! 5) HolmesAI Persona-powered decentralized AI agent platform @HolmesAI_ raised $3M in a Seed+ round from Bitrise Capital, Waterdrip Capital, HashKey, and CGV Fund. Their AI agent service platform based on Persona, which leverages personalized knowledge bases to deliver more human-like and contextually aware AI assistants for various industries. Smaller, purpose-built agents is the way to go! --- Congrats to all the teams on their fundraises! If you enjoyed this post, please Comment, Like, and Repost! And give me a follow @mikewchan for more crypto and fundraising content. Thanks for reading!

Deep Ventures invests early. Sometimes ridiculously early. Sometimes when the startup is just a twinkle in the founder's eye. We may tell founders that their idea is not a good fit for us. Or that we don't see enough founder-market fit. Or that we don't have enough conviction. But we will never tell a founding team, "you're too early for us".

How do you build crypto privacy products in a world where regulators are cracking down? The arrest of Tornado Cash’s founders was a turning point for privacy in crypto. Panther Protocol had to rethink its approach and fast, which led to their shift to a hybrid compliance approach that allows "zone managers" to maintain their preferred level of compliance and onboard users. This means privacy is preserved, but there’s still a responsible entity addressing regulators’ main concern - who is accountable? “If you want to make everyone’s life better, it’s not about compliance or no compliance, it's about the right compliance system that can actually move society forward.” - Oliver Gale Link to video in next tweet

I don't know about you, but I can already sense the regulatory clarity based on the products and solutions that are being offered to the US market. @mikewchan of @DeepVenturesVC and I discussed Project Crypto and some of the updates coming from Coinbase. Plus the latest funding rounds from Stable (stablecoin layer 1), Manifold (subnet on Bittensor) and Courtyard (NFT's backed by physical assets). Link in the comments for the curious minds!

Grit is the #1 characteristic of successful founders. Being mission-driven is probably #2. @ramonrecuero, @VictorSanchez and the @KintoXYZ team have faced multiple instances of bad luck: 1) Getting DDoSd on their TGE day 2) The $K token being the only one hacked when a widely-used smart contract was identified as being vulnerable (not their fault) They could have shut it all down and moved on. In both instances, the team chose to do what's best for the community. They are mission-driven, think long-term, and don't give up. They epitomize grit and perseverance. It's an honor to work with this team. The Phoenix rises again tomorrow.

Happy Friday! Here are the 5 most interesting crypto fundraises for the week ending 8/1/25. 1) Stable L1 stablecoin blockchain @stable raised $28M in a Seed round led by Bitfinex, Hack VC, and USDT0, with participation from Franklin Templeton, Castle Island Ventures, and others. Stable is purpose-built to power instant, low-cost USDT transactions. Very odd that Bitfinex also backed Plasma, another chain that also optimizes USDT transactions. 2) Manifold Labs Decentralized AI compute infra @manifoldlabs raised $10.5M in a Series A round led by OSS Capital with participation from DCG. Manifold runs the @TargonCompute subnet on Bittensor, which operates as a transparent marketplace for GPU compute, leveraging cryptographically verifiable auctions and price discovery. Love the Bittensor eco and we are actively investing there! 3) Solo Decentralized identity protocol @SOLOAPI raised $1.2M in a Pre-seed round led by Draper Associates with participation from Velocity Capital. Solo leverages mobile devices for biometric verification to support anonymity and user control over data. DID is so important to ensure human users and sybil protection. 4) Courtyard Tokenized physical collectibles marketplace @Courtyard_io raised $30M in a Series A round led by Forerunner Ventures, with participation from NEA, Y Combinator, and others. Courtyard transforms physical collectibles such as trading cards, sports memorabilia, and vintage items into verifiable digital assets, enabling instant, secure trading and fractional ownership on-chain. Tokenize all the things. 5) GAIB Economic layer for AI and compute @gaib_ai raised $10M in a strategic funding round led by Amber Group. GAIB transforms GPU-backed assets into yield-generating opportunities through its AI synthetic dollar, AID, which allows investors to access the AI economy while earning real yield from AI-powered compute. Connecting AI infra with DeFi, I love it. --- Congrats to all the teams for their fundraises! If you enjoyed this post, please Comment, Like, and Repost! And give me a follow @mikewchan for more crypto and fundraising content. Thanks for reading!

Super excited to back the @yanez__ai team and support their @bittensor_ Subnet 54, Yanez MIID! Their integration of Bittensor to generate synthetic ID datasets is a breakthrough in how financial crime prevention apps are built. And I believe this decentralized approach can and will be applied to all AI-driven apps, with the Yanez team leading the charge.

Had an awesome time at the crypto meetup I hosted in Zurich last night! 🇨🇭 It was great to connect with new people, meet people IRL I've had calls with in the past, and hang with @DeepVenturesVC portfolio company OrdinalsBot founder @bruffstar! Huge thanks to everyone who attended. Zurich is a beautiful city with amazing people, can't wait to come back!

“Privacy isn’t about hiding, it's about the freedom to choose what you share.” @ZKPanther started with a bold vision: private digital cash as a true bearer instrument. But as the crypto privacy space was under siege by regulators, @OriginalOlii and the Panther team realized that they had to strike a balance between privacy and compliance. So they designed a system where “zone managers” (who can be institutions or individuals) onboard users under their own compliance rules. Users get privacy without forced disclosure, while zone managers take responsibility for compliance. Panther exemplifies the delicate balance between privacy, compliance, and usability, turning a complex vision into a tool for real financial freedom. Learn more about Panther from our State of Crypto Privacy panel, link in the tweet below.

Most data-driven applications rely on collecting and warehousing massive amounts of data, creating a dangerous honeypot waiting to be breached. @auryn_macmillan ’s vision with @EnclaveE3 flips this model: "Our goal is to stop aggregating raw data and start producing insights directly from data held by its rightful owners. That’s how we avoid creating honeypots in the first place." Beyond privacy, it’s about empowering individuals and organizations to control their data, participate in value creation, and reduce risks. Learn more about what Auryn is building at Enclave from our State of Crypto Privacy panel. Link in tweet below.

Zcash is realizing the vision of truly private, peer-to-peer digital cash, closer to what many believe Satoshi imagined. Using zero-knowledge proofs, Zcash keeps transaction details fully encrypted, while still ensuring the network follows all the same core rules (no double spending, correct balances, etc.). @PaulBrigner of Electric Coin Co says. "It allows for a ledger that’s essentially completely encrypted, yet verifiable. That’s real digital cash." At its core, the mission of Zcash is simple: Empower anyone to transact privately, at scale. View Paul's description of Zcash via the link below:

What makes a crypto VC actually useful to founders? We sat down with @mikewchan of @DeepVenturesVC to talk about founder empathy, raising in the bear, and how capital allocation is evolving in Web3. 🎧 Listen Here: buff.ly/mjZB9bG

Happy Independence Day! Here are the 5 most interesting crypto fundraises (according to me) for the week ending 7/4/25: 1) The Open Platform (TOP) Telegram app developer @topdotco (The Open Platform) raised $28.5M in a Series A led by Ribbit Capital, with participation from Pantera Capital. TOP builds apps on TON to integrate crypto into Telegram’s 1B+ user base. It’s primary product is TON’s most popular wallet, Wallet in Telegram. TOP will use the capital to expand into Western markets, enhance regulatory compliance, and incubate other TON-based projects. 2) Datagram AI‑native DePIN @DGramNetwork raised $4M in a Pre-seed round led by Blizzard Fund (Avalanche), with participation from Animoca Brands, Amber Group, AquaNow, and others. Datagram is building an AI-focused decentralized physical infrastructure network (DePIN) designed to harness idle compute, storage, and bandwidth to create a scalable, real-time backbone for digital applications like gaming, AI, and communications. The funding will support the launch of their L1 on Avalanche, accelerate node deployment, and drive progress toward its mainnet launch and upcoming node sale. 3) Limitless Decentralized social prediction protocol @trylimitless raised $4M in a Strategic round from Coinbase Ventures, Maelstrom, Node Capital, and others. Limitless is the largest prediction market platform on Base, enabling users to wager on short-term price movements of assets like Bitcoin, with over $250 million in trading volume since launch. They are preparing for a token generation event (TGE), have launched a points program to incentivize user engagement, and recently welcomed Arthur Hayes as an advisor. 4) XO Market Permissionless prediction market @xodotmarket raised $500k in a Pre-seed round led by Cyber Fund and Delphi Ventures with participation from Binary Builders and Nick White. XO Market allows anyone to create and trade on custom prediction markets, featuring adaptive liquidity and AI-driven resolution mechanisms. It is built on a sovereign rollup secured by Celestia’s data availability layer (hence the Nick White check!) Prediction markets are so hot right now! 5) Zypher Network ZK trust layer for AI agents @Zypher_Network raised $7M in a funding round led by UOB Venture Management and Signum Capital, with participation from Hashkey Capital, Cogitent Ventures, and many others. Zypher uses zero-knowledge (ZK) proofs to certify AI agent integrity, transparency, and data privacy across applications like legal operations, customer support, and finance. The funding will accelerate development of Zypher’s ZK protocol stack and AI-specific rollup infrastructure, supporting its flagship product, Proof of Prompt, and expanding its open-source suite for verifiable, secure AI agent automation. --- Congrats to all the teams for their fundraises! If you enjoyed this post, please Comment, Like, and Repost! And give me a follow @mikewchan for more crypto and fundraising content. Thanks for reading!

Missed The State of Crypto Privacy panel? Here's a quick recap and link to the video! Panelists included: - @paulbrigner of @Zcash / @ElectricCoinCo - @OriginalOlii of @ZKPanther - @auryn_macmillan of @EnclaveE3 We discussed: - The recent data leak of 16B records and how blockchain privacy could have helped - Privacy use cases - ZKPs, FHE, and other privacy tech - How regulation has impacted crypto privacy - Much more! There's more than an hour of amazing insight! Link to video below 👇

The State of Crypto Privacy is happening tomorrow at 1PM ET! Join @paulbrigner from @Zcash, @OriginalOlii from @ZKPanther, @auryn_macmillan from @EnclaveE3 and me for a chat about how crypto is changing the privacy world! Register here: lu.ma/93vuw7qm See you tomorrow!

Our founder @auryn_macmillan is joining a panel on The State of Crypto Privacy, July 1 @ 1PM ET. Join us! Topics: 🔹Txn & data privacy 🔹Emerging tools & use cases 🔹What’s next for crypto privacy With: • @paulbrigner (@Zcash @ElectricCoinCo) • @OriginalOlii (@ZKPanther) • @mikewchan (@DeepVenturesVC, moderator) 🎟️ Register here: lu.ma/93vuw7qm