Top 10 Crypto Founders Under 30

Crypto is the only sector where young entrepreneurs can thrive and build billion-dollar companies well before hitting the ripe age of 30.

Some of the biggest companies and projects in Web3, starting with OpenSea and ending with Uniswap, have been built by young and ambitious entrepreneurs.

In today’s article, we’ll give you the top 15 biggest crypto founders and entrepreneurs who started their companies while being under 30 years old. Enjoy!

Vitalik Buterin – Ethereum

Vitalik Buterin is the co-creator of Ethereum, a blockchain platform for decentralized applications. He became the youngest crypto billionaire at 27 when Ether, Ethereum’s native cryptocurrency, surpassed $3,000 per coin in 2021.

This year, Vitalik hit 30, but we couldn’t omit him as he’s the reason we have decentralized finance and dApps in the first place!

Before Ethereum, Buterin wrote for Bitcoin Magazine, which he co-founded in 2012. In 2014, he received the Thiel Fellowship, funding his work on Ethereum.

Launched in 2015, Ethereum enables DeFi and a wide range of applications using smart contracts, which automatically execute agreements. Ethereum has become a leading platform for blockchain-based financial tools, games, and dApps.

Emmanuel Quezada – U-topia

Emmanuel Quezada is the founder and CEO of U-topia Ecosystem, a company focused on making Web3 technology accessible. Born in Mexico, Quezada is a multi-award-winning entrepreneur with a mission to introduce people, especially children, to Web3 in a safe environment.

U-topia, launched in 2021, blends entertainment, blockchain, and finance to create a seamless Web3 experience. Its UWallet allows users to easily create accounts and earn $U-Coin rewards through media engagement and purchases.

U-topia aims to bridge media and blockchain, offering decentralized, rewarding experiences while promoting mental health and well-being through technology.

Hayden Adams – Uniswap

Hayden Adams is the creator of Uniswap, a decentralized cryptocurrency exchange. A graduate of Stony Brook University, Adams worked as an analyst at Siemens before pursuing an idea from Ethereum inventor Vitalik Buterin.

In 2018, he launched Uniswap, which uses automated market makers to allow users to trade crypto without intermediaries. Uniswap quickly became one of the most popular crypto applications, surpassing $1 trillion in lifetime trading volume in 2023.

It operates on the Ethereum blockchain, and its governance token, UNI, is one of the largest cryptocurrencies by market cap.

Antonio Juliano – dYdX

Antonio Juliano is the founder of dYdX, a DEX focused on crypto derivatives trading. After working as a developer at Coinbase and Uber, Juliano launched dYdX in 2017 to cater to professional traders outside the U.S.

dYdX allows users to trade perpetual futures on more than 35 cryptocurrencies, including Bitcoin and Ethereum, with leverage options. Initially built on Ethereum, dYdX later transitioned to a layer-2 solution, Starkware, due to high gas fees.

In its latest update, dYdX v4 moved to its own blockchain using the Cosmos SDK, achieving full decentralization across its protocol.

Kevin Sekniqi – Avalanche

Kevin Sekniqi is the youngest co-founder of Ava Labs and played a key role in creating Avalanche, a high-speed blockchain platform. Avalanche addresses the blockchain trilemma—scalability, security, and decentralization—through its unique PoS system.

Known for its speed and efficiency, Avalanche supports smart contracts and is compatible with Ethereum’s Solidity language, enabling seamless integration with established DeFi projects like Aave and Curve.

Its native token, AVAX, powers transactions, facilitates governance and distributes rewards. Recently, KKR chose Avalanche to tokenize part of its healthcare fund, showcasing its appeal to institutional investors.

Victor Faramond – MoonPay

Victor Faramond is the Chief Technology Officer of MoonPay, a service that simplifies crypto purchases using conventional payment methods like credit cards and mobile wallets such as Apple Pay and Google Pay.

Since its launch in 2019, MoonPay has gained over 10 million users across 160 countries, making it one of the leading fiat-to-crypto payment gateways.

In June 2024, MoonPay partnered with major names like Universal Pictures, Fox Corporation, and Death Row Records to launch HyperMint, an NFT platform aimed at making NFTs more accessible to a broad audience.

Sam Kazemian – Frax Finance

Sam Kazemian, an Iranian immigrant and UCLA graduate in philosophy and neuroscience, founded Frax Finance in 2019. Frax is a DeFi platform that provides a stablecoin, FRAX, pegged to the U.S. dollar, and a lending platform.

FRAX, initially a hybrid of collateralized and algorithmic models, is now fully collateralized and ranks among the top five global stablecoins with a $1.4 billion market value.

With a small team, Frax generated $83 million in 2022 and $46 million in 2023, primarily through trading fees and lending, solidifying its role in the DeFi landscape.

Ophelia Snyder – 21Shares

Ophelia Snyder co-founded 21Shares in 2018, aiming to create accessible crypto investment tools.

Today, the company manages over $2.5 billion in assets and charges about a 2% management fee for its 15 cryptocurrency ETPs across four countries. Based in Switzerland, 21Shares is valued at $700 million and is projected to earn $60 million in revenue this year.

Snyder, a Stanford graduate, filed with the SEC alongside Cathie Wood in a bid to launch the first Bitcoin ETF. Her mission was inspired by making crypto investment simple and safe for everyday investors, like her mother.

Jayendra Jog and Jeff Feng – Sei Labs

Jayendra Jog, a former Robinhood engineer, and Jeff Feng, previously with Goldman Sachs, co-founded Sei, a blockchain optimized for trading digital assets. Launched in August, Sei aims to provide a fast, efficient foundation for decentralized exchanges and trading apps.

It achieves a transaction finality time of 500 milliseconds, significantly faster than Ethereum's six minutes. Sei was built with the Cosmos SDK, making it interoperable with other blockchains through the Inter-Blockchain Communication Protocol.

With $35 million in funding and 7 million active wallets, Sei has quickly gained traction as a high-performance, decentralized trading infrastructure.

Eva Beylin – The Graph

Eva Beylin is the director of The Graph Foundation, leading the growth of The Graph, an indexing protocol often called the "Google of blockchains."

She has overseen the distribution of over $135 million in grants to core developers and spearheaded a $50 million capital raise in January, led by Tiger Global.

The Graph collects, processes, and stores blockchain data, making it easy for dApps like Aave, Curve, and Uniswap to retrieve information quickly using GraphQL.

Beylin also gained attention when Elon Musk reposted her meme, which she sold as an NFT for nearly $20,000. Under her leadership, The Graph continues to enhance blockchain data accessibility and efficiency.

Eric Chen and Albert Chon – Injective

Eric Chen and Albert Chon co-founded Injective, a blockchain built specifically for DeFi applications. Injective enables fast, low-cost transactions, facilitating over 300 million transactions worth nearly $13 billion at an average cost of less than a cent.

The project has raised $57 million from investors like Binance Labs and Mark Cuban, and in January, launched a $150 million fund with support from Pantera Capital and Kraken Ventures to promote DeFi growth.

Built on Cosmos SDK, Injective supports various financial applications like spot and derivatives trading and enables cross-chain interoperability with networks including Ethereum and Solana.