Why Crypto VCs Are Playing a 15-Year Game

42% fewer deals, but 14% more capital deployed. At Consensus Hong Kong, crypto VCs weren't talking retreat—they were talking recalibration.

The Barbell Strategy Emerges

Dragonfly's Hasseeb Qureshi described today's venture landscape as a "barbell." On one side: proven verticals scaling up. On the other: highly selective bets on next-generation tech.

"There's stuff that's working, and it's just like, scale it up, go even bigger," Qureshi explained, pointing to stablecoins, payments, and tokenization. These sectors still demonstrate product-market fit and real revenue in a market that's cooled from speculative excess.

The other end? AI agents capable of transacting onchain. But Qureshi was brutally honest: "If you give an AI agent some crypto, it's probably going to lose it within a couple days." The opportunity is real, but so are the attack vectors.

Lessons from Generational Misses

The candid tone extended to admitting mistakes. Qureshi initially dismissed NFTs as "definitely a bubble," only to reverse course months later and back infrastructure plays like Blur. That experience taught him to balance conviction with adaptability in fast-moving cycles.

More painful was Polymarket. "We were actually his first term sheet," Qureshi said of founder Shayne Coplan, but passed when a rival fund offered higher valuation. He called it a "generational miss," though Dragonfly later joined a 2024 round and became a major shareholder.

The takeaway? Thematic conviction—in this case, prediction markets—can take years to pay off.

The 15-Year Thesis

Maximum Frequency Ventures' Mo Shaikh argued that crypto venture success still hinges on long time horizons. His best thesis wasn't a trade but a 15-year bet that blockchain could re-architect financial risk systems.

"Have a 15-year timeline," he advised, urging founders and investors to resist 18-month cycle thinking. This long-term view separates serious builders from momentum chasers.

Pantera Capital's Paul Veradittakit provided the data backing this "flight to quality." While deal count fell 42%, crypto VC capital rose 14% year-over-year. Money is concentrating into "accomplished entrepreneurs" and "tangible use cases."

What This Means for Founders

After more than a decade fundraising in crypto—from $25 million early funds dominated by family offices to today's $6 billion platform—Veradittakit sees institutions driving the next phase. But his advice to founders was blunt: "Focus on product-market fit... If there is a token, it'll naturally come."

This represents a fundamental shift from the 2021 playbook where tokens often preceded products. Now, utility comes first.

The Institutional Wave

The venture environment feels tighter because it is. But this concentration of capital into fewer, higher-quality deals mirrors broader market maturation. Institutions are increasingly comfortable with crypto as an asset class, but they demand the same rigor they'd expect from any other sector.

For crypto founders, this means traditional metrics matter more than ever: revenue growth, user retention, regulatory compliance. The days of raising on white papers and promises are largely over.