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Why crypto venture capitalists at Consensus Hong Kong are playing a 15-year game

CoinDesk
Crypto VCs at Consensus Hong Kong are recalibrating strategies, focusing on proven sectors like stablecoins while making selective, long-term bets on emerging areas like AI.

Summary

Venture capitalists attending Consensus Hong Kong acknowledged a recalibrated market environment following a downturn, describing the current venture landscape as a "barbell." This means investors are scaling up what is already working, specifically stablecoins, payments, and tokenization, which show clear product-market fit and revenue. On the other end are narrow, high-risk, next-generation bets, such as the intersection of crypto and artificial intelligence (AI) agents. Leaders like Hasseeb Qureshi of Dragonfly emphasized the need for adaptability, citing past misses on NFTs and prediction markets like Polymarket, which reinforced the idea that thematic conviction can take years to materialize. Mo Shaikh of Maximum Frequency Ventures urged founders and investors to adopt a 15-year timeline for blockchain's potential to re-architect financial risk systems. Paul Veradittakit of Pantera Capital noted that while overall deal count has fallen, capital concentration shows a “flight to quality” toward accomplished entrepreneurs and tangible use cases, advising founders to prioritize product-market fit over immediate tokenization.

(Source:CoinDesk)