SEA Spring 2022

VeradiVerdict - Issue #189

March 24, 2022

As we are heading into the final fundraising close of our latest venture capital fund, I decided to make trip out to Southeast Asia to visit Singapore and Thailand, two countries that recently opened up to visitors without quarantine.

Some insights from Singapore:

  • Family offices and sovereign wealth funds have progressed quite a bit in terms of fund and direct investments

  • Quite a bit of our portfolio companies have a Singapore HQ or presence and it was great to see them

    • Bybit/BitDAO - futures/spot exchange, dao-directed treasury

    • Amber - retail super app, trading execution

    • Instadapp - defi infrastructure

    • Vauld - yield and swaps

    • SynFutures - decentralized derivatives

    • StaDer - liquid staking and structured products

    • Kyber - decentralized exchange

    • Acala - Polkadot DeFi Hub

    • Rangers Protocol - virtual world blockchain infrastructure

    • Celer - blockchain interoperability protocol

  • Crypto companies in Singapore tend to be in the categories of centralized infrastructure for fiat-on ramps or decentralized finance

  • Potential path to regulatory clarity as the MAS (monetary authority of Singapore) has started to grant crypto licenses to crypto companies, luring entrepreneurs to re-locate to the country and setting up a crypto hub for Asia

Some insights from Thailand:

  • Fairly large crypto trading community in the country with some crypto funds that are starting to reach significant AUM

  • The biggest crypto startup news in the country was the acquisition of the largest exchange in the country, Bitkub, by Siam Commercial Bank that values the company as a unicorn. The company is one of 4 exchanges that have a crypto license in the country

  • GuildFi, the largest gaming guild in the country and a Pantera portfolio company, is primed to support crypto p2e games in the country and region

  • Some of the other more prominent crypto startups in the country include Alpha Finance and Band Protocol.

  • Enterprise use cases of blockchain are being explored in the country including digital identity, energy, healthcare, etc.

- Paul Veradittakit

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DIGESTS

Even though mining margins have shrunk since crypto prices corrected, for now they’re big enough to keep luring entrants from sectors like prepackaged food and anti-aging formulas.

NEWS

Goldman is the first major U.S. bank to trade crypto over the counter, CNBC was first to report. The bank traded a bitcoin-linked instrument called a non-deliverable option with crypto merchant bank Galaxy Digital, the firms said.

The agreement could bring blockchain integrations and NFTs to the popular battle-royale style game.

IN THE TWEETS

REGULATION

The crypto community needs to do a better job of lobbying and educating politicians, said Galaxy Digital chief Mike Novogratz.

The Fed is sharing its analysis on central bank digital currencies (CBDC) with six other central banks at the BIS, said Chair Jerome Powell.

NEW PRODUCTS AND HOT DEALS

Potential customers can now join the waiting list ahead of the launch next month.

The Mina Ecosystem has raised $92 million in a token sale co-led by Three Arrows Capital and FTX Ventures.

LETS MEET UP

Los Angeles, April 20-22

Crypto Bahamas, Bahamas, April 26-29

Miami, May 2

Walks and coffee meetings in San Francisco throughout the year!

ABOUT ME

Hi, I’m Paul Veradittakit, a Partner at Pantera Capital, one of the oldest and largest institutional investors focused on investing in blockchain companies and cryptocurrencies. I’ve been in the industry since 2014, and the firm invests in equity, early stage token projects, and liquid cryptocurrencies on exchanges. I focus on early-stage investments and share my thoughts on what’s going on in the industry in this weekly newsletter.