‘Crypto markets are in a weird spot’ while public markets heat up

This is a segment from the Empire newsletter. To read full editions, subscribe.

---

Any time you have Dragonfly’s Haseeb Qureshi and 6MV’s Mike Dudas on the same stage, you know you’re in for a good (and insightful) time. 

They didn’t disappoint last week when they shared a stage with Selini Capital’s Jordi Alexander and Blockworks Research’s Boccaccio. 

Qureshi noted that right now, crypto markets are in a weird spot. 

“I’ve never seen this place where crypto markets are kind of staid and rational and reasonable, and they’re kind of [sitting on the] sidelines. And public markets are just a bullion, they’re insane. 

“No one understands what’s going on. Nobody can explain anything. So it’s a weird moment, and I can’t imagine it’s going to persist for that long, but that’s where we are right now. All of the energy is in public markets and not in crypto markets,” he said.

Which makes a lot of sense. Look at the demand for Circle, for example. Or any of the crypto treasury companies. 

This doesn’t mean that crypto VCs are in for a total loss, however. 

“One of the things that people often forget about crypto VCs is that we do both…Roughly on a cost basis, when we invest into startups, about half of our investments are into equity and about half of them are into tokens. And so it’s weird that the tokens are doing not-so-great, and the equities are doing kind of weirdly amazing. But it’s like, okay, cool. We’re exposed to both,” he explained. 

For Dudas, though, it means that he’s seeing more projects lean into valuing the token. 

“We’re in a real moment of flux where I think it’s a good thing, in that people realize that equity can have value…but you should have a line of sight to some credible token value accrual,” he told the crowd at Permissionless last week. 

So both of these tied together have put crypto in a bit of an awkward position right now. But it doesn’t seem like this is going to be forever. Perhaps things like the Token Transparency Framework from my Blockworks colleagues can help move us in the right direction, which might break up the equity favoritism. 

---

Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:

• The Breakdown: Decoding crypto and the markets. Daily.
• Empire: Crypto news and analysis to start your day.
• Forward Guidance: The intersection of crypto, macro and policy.
• 0xResearch: Alpha directly in your inbox.
• Lightspeed: All things Solana.
• The Drop: Apps, games, memes and more.
• Supply Shock: Bitcoin, bitcoin, bitcoin.