Portal Ventures raises $75M for pre-seed crypto fund

Portal Ventures has closed its second fund, raising $75 million to invest in pre-seed Web3 startups. 

The fund includes backing from investors such as a16z’s Marc Andreessen and Chris Dixon, along with the contribution of funds of funds, including Accolade Partners, Theta Capital, and CrossLayer Capital. 

The venture firm is based in New York City and claims to have invested in crypto startups even before a white paper or pitch deck had been drafted. According to Crunchbase, its portfolio includes startups like Plume Network — offering real-world assets tokenization — and crypto lending platform Arch. 

According to a spokesperson for Portal, the fund invests in only one founder per category, with a strong emphasis on Bitcoin programmability, decentralized infrastructure (DePIN) and maximal extractable value (MEV) business models. 

Over the past few months, several venture firms have announced raising efforts for new funds targeting blockchain-based startups. In April, Paradigm sought to secure $850 million for a new fund — the firm’s largest since a $2.5 billion fund in 2021. Some of Paradigm’s most notable investments in the space include Coinbase, Fireblocks, Blast, Optimism, Uniswap and FTX. 

Related: Temasek-backed blockchain VC firm to start new investment fund

Dragonfly Capital and Pantera Capital had also announced new ventures. In April, Pantera sought $1 billion with investors for an “all-in-one” fund focusing on a broad spectrum of blockchain-based assets, while Dragonfly disclosed in September plans to raise $500 million for its fourth crypto fund, also aimed at early-stage startups. 

Despite a 20% decline in total investment between quarters, with $2.4 billion raised across 478 deals in the third quarter of 2024, early-stage funding remains resilient. Angel, pre-seed and seed rounds accounted for 85% of all capital poured into crypto startups over the period, according to data from Galaxy Research. 

Year-to-date, venture capitalists have invested $8 billion in crypto startups, keeping the year on track to match or slightly surpass the total investment seen in 2023, largely by early-stage activity.

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