WHEN THE HEAD IS ENCRYPTED, THE VC IS COMPLETELY REDUCED
Author: ChainCatcher
AT THE TIME OF THE OVERALL DECLINE OF THE ENCRYPTION MARKET, ALMOST ALL OF THE ENCRYPTED VCS HAD SHRUNK AND THE INDUSTRY HAD ENTERED A BRUTAL CLEAN-UP CYCLE. IN THIS CONTEXT, HOWEVER, AN ENCRYPTED VENTURE FUND THAT HAS BEEN IN EXISTENCE FOR LESS THAN FIVE YEARS BECOMES THE PERFECT EXCEPTION, COMING OUT OF THE GROWTH CURVE IN A CONTRACTION
According to Fortune journalists received an undisclosed collection of encrypted VC financial disclosure documents from SEC in the United States last week, data show that the size of management assets (AUM) of the head offices Paradigm, Pantera, a16z crypto, Multicoin and others contracted in 2025, more than half of which Multicoin contracted。
The only negative growth was made by Haun Ventures, a wind-in fund that had been in existence for only four years, with its management increasing from the initial $1 billion to $2.5 billion in 2025。
This is not a matter of luck in the miserable encrypted market. Last year, market sources reported that Haun Ventures was close to completing a new billion-dollar fund-raising round, which reflects the unique investment strategy of Haun Ventures and its founder, Katie Haun, which has moved to the top of the VC through market and LP tests。
Visible founder style and background
Haun Ventures, different, had an ambush from the beginning。
The founder, Katie Haun, is not a typical encrypted investor. She has long served as a United States federal prosecutor for more than a decade in financial crime investigations and created the United States Government ' s first encryption currency task force. In 2018, she became the first female partner in a16z and co-directed the Fund ' s encrypted money fund, and also entered the Coinbase Board of Directors, thereby combining policy perspectives, institutional resources and operational experience。
This experience has led to an understanding of the encryption industry not simply in terms of “technical potential” or “market size”, but in terms of compliance boundaries, systemic risks and institutional embedded capacity. The impact of this context is not obvious but far-reaching enough。
It is worth noting that Haun Ventures is one of the only foundations in the encryption industry named after its founders, which reflects its distinct founder-dominated style. Another VC named after its founder was a16z。
Haun Ventures was not perfect in the early days of their creation, but also stepped on the pits of the market boom. Looking back at investment records, Haun Ventures once identified NFT as an investment focus area, investing at least four NFT projects in Opensea, Autograph, ZORA, Highlight in the first half of 2022。
But as the bubbles of concepts such as NFT burst rapidly, Haun Ventures demonstrated an extraordinary ability to correct errors and integrities, rapidly shrinking the front from the second half of 2022, significantly reducing the frequency of hand-outs to respond with extreme caution to market downturns。
Based onRootDataData, in the second half of 2022 and throughout 2023, for 18 months, Haun Ventures publicly disclosed that there were only 6 rounds of participation, an average of one in three months。
As of June 2023, the Haun Ventures partner Rosenblum stated in an interview that the company ' s investments were almost evenly divided between digital tokens and traditional equity, and that about 30 per cent of the funds had been invested in some twenty-two projects, including open transactions and highly liquid coins. These are well-known encrypted currencies such as bitcoin and the Taifung, as well as small market value coins associated with the project。
At that time, the price of bitcoin had been hovering at a price range of $15-$3 million for a long time, and since then it had risen to a maximum of $126,000 in 2025, which had also generated very significant investment gains for Haun Ventures, which had largely compensated for investment losses in areas such as NFT and had become an important building block for scale growth。
Key transformations
Starting in 2024, the investment strategy of Haun Ventures began to shift significantly, with the investment focus shifting to B-end solutions such as payment, developer platform, etc。
At that time, these directions were not sexy, they lacked stories of surges, and it was difficult to create market sentiment in a short period of time, yet they coincided with the key nodes of the industry ' s shift from speculation to practicality。
During the year, Haun Ventures invested in a stable currency payment platform, Bridge, Encrypted Native Infrastructure Platform Conduit, Encrypted Protocol Economic Security Solutions Chaos Labs, Solana Development Platform Helius, Encrypted Payment Platform BVNK, and others, nearly 10 B-end companies。
And in the investment style, Haun Ventures is particularly fond of leading the vote. According to RootData data, out of the 39 financing rounds in which they participated publicly, the number of hits reached 22 and the number of hits exceeded 56 per cent, which ranked first in line VC. This reflects Haun Ventures ' extraordinary belief in its portfolio and its willingness to support early projects with high potential with large amounts of money。
Today, payments have become the highest valuation premium in the encryption field and the clearest path to exit. The early layout of Haun Ventures, combined with the traditional style of leading investments, gave them very significant exit returns。
Since October 2024, more than five portfolio companies have been bought and sold, with several paying firms achieving high multiplier returns. For example, Haun Ventures, which had received $200 million in valuations for the Stable Currency Development Platform Bridge, was eventually purchased for over $1.1 billion. Haun Ventures used to give a $750 million valuation to the encrypted payment platform BVNK and eventually acquired over $1.8 billion。
In an environment of shrinking access to encrypted assets and a high concentration of second-tier market liquidity to the head, Haun Ventures demonstrates the viability of another route: Investment in equity in companies with traditional financial compatibility that can solve real payment pains and achieve multiple exits through M&As is more capital efficient than a collection of highly liquid coins。
The evolutionary path of Haun Ventures, from the pursuit of hot spots NFT, to balanced configuration of tokens and shares, to focus on B-end payments and infrastructure, is precisely a microcosm of encrypted VCs moving from speculative to value-oriented. Katie Haun ' s compliance background, the Fund ' s rapid error correction capacity, a prudent hand-to-hand rhythm, a heavy-barrel strategy with high lead rates, superseding precision on real applications and exit paths, together building the cyclical moat
When the industrial bubble retreats, the institutions that expand with stories and leverage shrink, and Haun Ventures, which is based on compliance and robustness, become the most certain winner in the encrypted winter and point to the survival and growth logic of the next phase for the entire VC industry。
