The Chopping Block: VC vs. Liquid Funds, Friend.Tech’s Decline, Crypto Startup Exits - Ep. 704

Unchained

Laura Shin

Tech News, Business News, News

4.6 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 13 September 2024

⏱️ 67 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Welcome to The Chopping Block – where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, Tarun Chitra, and Robert Leshner chop it up about the latest news in crypto. This week the squad is joined by special guest Jason Choi, co-founder of Tangent. In this episode the crew tackles the overvaluation of crypto projects by VCs, Friend.Tech’s 96% token crash, and the ethics of early token launches They also explore how airdrop farming skews user metrics, the volatility of memecoins, and whether VCs are extracting more value from crypto than they contribute. Tune in for insights into the ever-evolving crypto landscape! Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, Podcast Addict, Pocket Casts, Pandora, Castbox, Google Podcasts, TuneIn, Amazon Music, or on your favorite podcast platform. Show highlights 🔹 Friend.Tech Token Crash: Friend.Tech’s token dropped 96%, highlighting the risks of launching tokens without sustainable product planning and user retention strategies. 🔹 Project Exits and Ethics: Early token launches raise concerns about ethical obligations when teams abandon projects, with accusations of rug-pulling increasing. 🔹 Airdrop Farming’s Impact: Airdrop farming distorts true user engagement, leading to inflated metrics that misrepresent product-market fit and real user growth. 🔹 Venture Capital in Crypto: Low barriers for VCs have led to inflated project valuations, often resulting in overhyped, underdelivered crypto ventures. 🔹 Challenges of Early Token Launches: Early token releases often harm long-term project potential by confusing market signals and damaging user retention. 🔹 VC vs. Liquid Funds: Debate over whether venture capital is extracting value from crypto or whether liquid funds can improve market efficiency. 🔹 Hedge Funds and Market Efficiency: Hedge funds may improve market liquidity, but their impact on long-term crypto growth remains under scrutiny. 🔹 Speculative Markets and Long-Term Value: The crypto market continues to grapple with balancing short-term speculative plays and the creation of sustainable, long-term value. Hosts ⭐️Haseeb Qureshi, Managing Partner at Dragonfly ⭐️Tom Schmidt, General Partner at Dragonfly ⭐️Tarun Chitra, Managing Partner at Robot Ventures Guest ⭐️Jason Choi, Co-Founder of Tangent Disclosures Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	The vast majority of VCs out there in crypto are pretty bad because the bar for quality was so low to enter back in like 2019 2020.
0:07.5	So there's self-select for bad projects that come to market at valuations that are way above what they should be so it just ends up
0:13.8	being a one-way ticket for those VCs to get to cash out those projects.
0:16.8	So that kind of phenomenon formed a very cynical view of what VCs are but I
0:21.2	think that's why we're very selective in terms of, you know, who we work with.
0:25.7	We love kind of co-investment with Dragonfly, for instance, because of the kind of, you know, similar
0:29.6	taste that we have in terms of selecting what we hope ideally are good for probably
0:33.2	on the pot yeah we paid him to say this to be clear not a dividend it's a tale of
0:38.7	two quand now your losses are on someone else's balance generally Generally speaking, aircrafts are kind of pointless anyways.
0:44.8	I made the trading firms who are very involved.
0:48.0	I like that eat of the ultimate possible.
0:49.7	D-5 protocols are the antidote to this problem. Hello everybody, welcome to the chapping block.
0:55.0	Every couple weeks, the four of us get together and give the industry insiders perspective
0:58.1	on the crypto topics of the day.
1:00.0	So quick intro, first you got Tom, the Defy Maven and Master of Memes.
1:03.3	Hello, everyone.
1:04.7	Next we've got Taroon, the gigabrain and Grand Pouba at Gauntlet.
1:08.2	Yo.
1:10.1	Jo.
1:10.2	Joining us today, we have a special guest Jason Choi, startup
1:12.8	tycoon at Tangent.
1:14.3	Hey everybody, thanks for having me.
	...

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