VanEck is making its first entry into the venture capital industry, aiming to invest in fintech, crypto and AI startups. The global asset manager raises $30 million for its first venture fund.
VanEck enters venture capital to invest in fintech, crypto and AI startups
VanEckthe global investment asset management giantentered the venture capital (VC) sector by launching its first fund.
According to what reported, it seems that the objective of the new VanEck Venturesa start-up fund of 30 million dollarsit’s from invest in fintech, crypto and AI startups. In practice, VanEck Ventures will be present in the pre-seed and seed funding stages of these startups.
This new decision by the asset manager reflects a long-term expansion strategyaiming to actively participate in what the future of finance will be.
In this regard, Jan van EckCEO of VanEck, commented the following:
“From pioneering an investment approach in gold in 1968 to recognizing the disruptive potential of Bitcoin in 2017, taking a long-term view of transformative opportunities has always been part of our investment philosophy . This fund extends this vision to the early-stage venture capital sector. We look forward to supporting the founders of what we consider to be some of the most disruptive companies in fintech, those building the future of finance.
VanEck Venture Capital to Back AI, Crypto and Fintech Startups as the Future of Finance
The announcement of VanEck’s entry into the crypto-venture capital sector came after he shared a tweet on X, in which he bid farewell to the venture capital industry.
“print(“Hello, VC world”). If you don’t know us yet, you might be able to tomorrow. Here’s VanEck’s origin story”
Here, the global asset manager wanted introduces itself to the entire Venture Capital space, recounting some key milestones in its history and its founder, from 1955 to today.
In any case, the new VanEck Ventures fund is led by Wyatt Lonergan and Juan Lopez, both experienced investors with expertise in fintech and crypto projects.
Note that both come from the leadership of Circle Ventures, the venture capital arm of USDC issuer Circle. Here, Lonergan and Lopez have successfully invested more than $50 million in early-stage companies, ranging from infrastructure to consumer applications.
VanEck Ventures plans to make between 25 and 35 investments in amounts ranging from $500,000 to $1 millionfocusing on businesses that offer both strategic and financial advantage. The fund has has already made 4 investments which have not yet been announced.
Forecasts on BTC and SOL
Last month, VanEck made headlines for his price predictions on certain cryptocurrencies.
In fact, for Bitcoin, VanEck had ventured with her prediction, stating that the queen of crypto BTC could reach a value of $2.9 million by 2050.
Not only that, VanEck also expressed his optimistic opinion regarding Solana (SOL). In practice, the global asset manager he is said to have declared that SOL could reach 50% of the market capitalization of Ethereum (ETH).
Currently, SOL’s market cap is $65.8 billion, less than a quarter of ETH’s $288 billion.