Shan Aggarwal

The largest acquisition in crypto history occurred just last month: Stripe's $1.1B deal for Bridge. This isn't just a headline—it's a signal of how payment rails are evolving at the intersection of crypto and traditional finance. This week at Lw3 in Dallas, I’ll be speaking on why this acquisition is more than a milestone—it's a glimpse of the future. Crypto-native payment rails are no longer a niche experiment; they’re becoming foundational to global commerce. At Reciprocal Ventures, we’ve been investing in the crypto payments ecosystem since the early days, partnering with pioneering companies like Coinflow Labs, Higlobe and True Markets. This space has been at the forefront of innovation, and we’ve seen firsthand how scalable, efficient, and transparent payment rails are reshaping the way value moves in a digital-first world. I’m excited to explore what this acquisition means for the growth of this ecosystem and why it's only the beginning of a broader wave of innovation and opportunity. If you’re at Lw3, come say hi. I'll be with Steven Feldman — we’d love to connect and share ideas.

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I rarely write about one particular token, but given the volume of requests for our thesis on Stacks STX, especially after the recent announcement https://lnkd.in/gWpkm-iu, I’m consolidating my thoughts here in one place. Hope this is helpful to those seeking to understand the STX ecosystem and the reasons behind our conviction. Full thesis here: https://lnkd.in/g2JGahpZ TLDR 1. It's the OG blue-chip crypto project. 2. It's the first compliant token: a key driver for institutional adoption is to use STX as the de facto BTC staking provider. 3. The most optimal return on risk for real “whales” to generate yield on BTC with peace of mind. 4. The undisputed forerunner in bitcoin L2 with 10 years of first-mover advantage. 5. It has a rare token standard moat. 6. Its ecosystem moat: 155 monthly actively developers + 60+ projects adopting its token standard 7. It's vastly being undervalued at the moment based on comparables in ethereum. 8. Tokenomics and token maturity: 100% vested. 9. Upcoming catalysts

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LP Tip #8 of #50: Your LP base should match your fund size. We are back with our regular programming. ➡️ Opinions are always my own and based on my experience.  ➡️ My focus for this post is on sub $200.0M funds. ➡️ The $ amounts I state below are guideposts never absolute rules.  ➡️ Some LPs want to have a certain % of the fund and size their investments in this way; others have set check sizes irrespective of fund size. I continue to be surprised at how much time new GPs waste with LPs that are unlikely to invest. I urge managers to better qualify LP leads and be extremely judicious with how they manage their time. In my experience there are 6 LP types that I consistently come across. See below. ▶️ Non- Institutional LPs:  1️⃣ High net worth individuals (HNWI) - There are different tiers of HNWI but assume that this is someone with at least $1.0M in net worth in liquid assets. In my experience they are the fastest to close and conduct limited diligence. I often see them investing $100K - $500K checks in funds. It is possible for a fund manager to close a $5.0M fund on entirely HNWIs. 2️⃣ Family Office - There are different types of family offices. For simplicity sake let us assume that this is a single-family office with an investment team and a set venture allocation. Keep in mind that family offices are hard to find because they do not want to be found. Typically, you find these via referrals from other GPs or your current LPs. I often see <=$50.0M funds composed of HNWI and family office LPs. I have seen a range of investment checks form family offices. 3️⃣ Corporate - I include banks in this category. Due to the market downturn these entities either halted or slowed pacing. In my experience I have seen corporates invest anywhere from $500K - $10.0M checks. This type of LP is often present in sub < $100M funds. ▶️ Institutional LPs:   4️⃣ Fund of Funds (FoFs) - Unlike the other LP types, FoFs need to raise from LPs. I have seen FoFs invest in fund sizes across the spectrum. Depending on the FoF they can invest in funds as small as $15.0M. 5️⃣ Foundations -  These are often investing to align with their mission. I would spend time understanding how you complement their programmatic work. I have seen foundations invest in $45.0M funds and above.  6️⃣ University Endowments - Endowments is where most new GPs waste time. It is important to ask if the university has an emerging manager program upfront. I have seen emerging manager programs invest in small funds ($25.0M - $65.0M). It also helps if the GP was an active alum of the university or had some unique relationship to the university.  If there is no emerging manager program I am often told that there should be a fund target on the low-end of anywhere b/w $150.0M - $200.0M to be considered.

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Have you heard of #CapVC? It’s an application platform designed specifically for the use of #VC firms. Essentially, it’s a robust #AI-powered tool made to simplify the daily operations of managing a #fund. Isn’t that something, a VC funded start-up designed to help improve the productivity of VC funding! According to this article from TechCrunch, Cap VC is looking to become much more than just an ‘operating system’ — the company aims to be a simplified and extremely efficient way to run a VC firm: reducing digital clutter by turning PDF files, income statements and balance sheets into readable data, automating company suggestions based on the context of a VC’s portfolio, and more. Cap VC is currently developing native apps on Mac and Windows, alongside releasing an API so that developers can build on top of their foundations. So, are any of my fellow VCs interested in using this software? If not Cap VC, is there any interest for similar software to be created down the line? Are there downsides to using a third-party application like this? I want to know what you all think.

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LP Tip #17 out of #50: Access isn’t achievable overnight. ➡️ Are you able to prove to an LP that you have unique and/or preferential access to deals? Almost everyone that pitches me a fund tells me they have access to unique deal flow given their networks. It is easy to say that but unfortunately not true for the majority of people that say it during pitches. Why? It can take years to build access. Furthermore, the strongest networks you have today should be helpful to source the types of deals your fund will invest in today. I often see first time managers have an interesting thesis but lack the established networks to source well so they have to spend time building a network while raising the fund which puts them at a disadvantage. My expectation is that you have those strong networks in place already. Below are four areas I think about when I am trying to better learn about your access. 1️⃣ In the Know:  Do you see or know about every deal in your area of focus? This assumes that you have a tight thesis and clarity on the type of founder you are looking to invest in. If you don’t know about a deal why didn’t you see it? Are you the first call for an operator about to start a company? 2️⃣ Depth and Strength of Network in Focus Area/s:  What are your personal and professional networks? What is the quality of the network in the area you are investing in? For example, do you know the most successful founders, operators, industry experts, angels, or investors in your target area? Are they sending you dealflow versus just being supportive? Are any of them seeking you out because you have some unique insight via research you published or community you built? How have these networks helped you secure access or support your founders? 3️⃣ Downstream Signal: Are you top of mind for downstream investors? Are you a signal for downstream investors? For example, if you are a seed investor are Series A investors in your area of focus knocking down your door for your deal flow? If not yet, what could you do in order to make that happen? 4️⃣ Ability to Expand Network:  Networks take time to build but they also need to grow and can evolve. Can you continue to build upon your network? 

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Grim news from Forbes last week. #Point72 Ventures (run by famous billionaire, Steve Cohen) has laid off their fintech team in an attempt to #pivot away from crypto and shift into more of a focus investing in #AI and defense technology startups. Five #investors, and a few rumored partners of the company including are also rumored to separate from Point72 as well. The initial wave of fintech #startups were intended to disrupt the old school banking system and allow modern technology to thrive. Now that AI is an #industry wide trendsetter, Point72 are making a dire mistake of using it as a replacement for human input and perspective instead of a supplement. Hopefully this won’t set a precedent for future companies to get rid of their fintech experts and #investors who use their skills to great success.

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Well-written and sourced article describing what's going in seed-stage venture market. At 9point8 Collective we tend to orbit the seed-stage (both ideating and developing companies to reach seed and helping post-seed companies refactor and scale in anticipation of A) and for many companies it's a critical inflection point which determines their long term success or failure. The main takeaways I was able to gather: 1️⃣ Many startups that raised seed rounds in 2021-2022 are struggling to secure Series A funding due to tighter market conditions and increased investor expectations. 2️⃣ Seed investors are becoming more cautious, leading to longer diligence processes and a preference for startups with strong traction or experienced founders. As a result, valuations have stayed relatively high even as deal flow reduces. 3️⃣ Startups are adopting various strategies to navigate this challenging environment, including cutting costs, raising bridge rounds or convertible notes, and M&A/acqui-hires. 4️⃣ Despite the challenges, there are opportunities for both startups and investors in this new landscape, particularly for those who can adapt to the changing market conditions. Investors are accumulating dry powder -- and with rates on the decline -- will be looking to deploy into companies with stronger fundamentals than their 2021-2022 counterparts.

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The state of venture capital is wild right now. We are witnessing a surge of innovation across the spectrum: - Funds merging - VC doing PE - PE doing VC - Secondary funds - Buyout funds - Spin-out funds - Debt funds - Continuation funds - Infrastructure funds - GP turnover - Hard Tech surging - Family Office uptick

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Welcome back from Labor Day! Let's make sure we'll all caught up before we make that final end of year push with #DigitalCurrents and Mark Yusko and I breakdown the Tech News on our podcast: https://lnkd.in/erVPBH4c

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The Wall Street Journal has an incredibly insightful op-ed from Paul Ryan (Political Office of Speaker Paul D. Ryan (WI-01)). Normally you hear #crypto advocates in terms of why it is a more stable store of value than even the formerly defacto standard of the United States Dollar. Obviously post FTX and Sam Bankman-Fried that idea held no standing. Of note though given the Former Speaker of the House's apporach is demonstrating sound financial and economic arguments highlighting facts about Saudi Arabia and China's postions and numbers one and two of our own foreign debt is that both are showing less appetites for our own dollars. Therefore, in terms of international competitiveness and national defense, adopting this standard could help increase our competitiveness and that of our country domestically and internationally. What do you think? #management #venturecapital #privateequity #capitalmarkets #cryptocurrencies

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💰Sharing a List of 80 Black-led VC funds (US based): About this list: I realized that I couldn’t find a current list of Black-led funds as of 2024 when a lot of new funds have launched over the last couple of years including GPs Sydney Paige Thomas, Terri Burns and more. I have been gathering a list of these funds in my network, and that I could find publicly over time so wanted to share with the ecosystem. Only 2% of VC funds are Black-led: I found 80 funds (maybe there’s more!). There are 3,417 VC firms in the US (according to NVCA). Founders - These funds invest from pre-seed through growth, some with a focus on diverse founders, others more broadly. ⅔ of them have OPEN funding applications that I’ve linked in the sheet. LPs - As mentioned, a number of these funds might not be in the databases used for tracking, so hope to get some more Black-led funds on your radar! VCs - maybe there are some funds you should get to know for deal sharing, etc 👉🏾Link to full list here: https://lnkd.in/gktBhY-W

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Industry Ventures has announced a $900M early-stage hybrid fund, signaling significant movement in venture funding and the secondary market. - Fund allocation: 40% to VC funds, 40% to Series B startup investments, 20% to acquiring stakes in emerging investment firms from other LPs. - The fund is over 50% larger than its $575M predecessor. - Focus on Series B companies from manager relationships. - Industry Ventures now manages over $8B in total assets. This development reflects significant activity in valuation, funding strategies, and secondary market dynamics. For the latest secondary coverage and trading SaxonWeber | ShareWell #secondaries #saxonweber

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Honored to have moderated a panel on the “Future of TV: The Great Unbundling + Rebundling” at PrivTech Invest NYC, hosted by our firm, Grit Capital Partners! Joined by industry leaders Peter Naylor, Jonathan Carson (Antenna, the leading analytics provider), + Jason Cohen (MyBundle), we explored the rapidly changing streaming landscape. Key insights: Consumer Shift: Over 50M U.S. households have cut the cord, putting consumers in control, driving demand for simpler, more tailored streaming options. Retention & Churn: With churn rates averaging 37% annually, streaming platforms are focusing on personalization, ad tiers, + exclusive content to retain viewers. Broadband & Bundling: Broadband providers are moving from TV to fiber (Fiber adoption is up 10% YoY), creating new ways to bundle streaming + broadband services to reduce churn + simplify billing  AI & Personalization: 75% of streamers say AI-powered recommendations improve their viewing experience. Thank you to our panelists for joining us to discuss these trends + the opportunities ahead. New era for TV 🚀 #Streaming #Partnerships #Innovation #CustomerExperience #Customerfirst #bundling #ai

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The Information just broke news of Stripe and it's bold $1.1B acquisition of Bridge. This is exciting and a very bold move that Stripe plans to move further into #crytpopayments and the ability, operationally, to simultaneously speed up #payments and lower costs. What do you think? #management #venturecapital #privateequity #capitalmarkets #fintech https://lnkd.in/gvhjG22g

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Tribe AI just raised our first external round of capital from Bryce Roberts at Indie, with significant participation from our customers, partners and network of top AI engineers. We’re excited to share this milestone in TechCrunch (thanks Rebecca Szkutak for sharing our story!) along with some long overdue updates:  💲 Raised $3.25M to keep up with demand and build the platform to enable service delivery at a tremendous scale 🚀 8 figure revenue run rate, more than doubling year over year (and accelerating) 🏛 Enterprise customers from the Fortune 20  🧠 500 top AI engineers from places like Google, Tesla, Meta and OpenAI As a refresher, Tribe is an AI-native services company that helps Enterprises build best in class AI products. Our team is augmented by a talent network of over 500 top AI engineers from places like Google, Tesla, Meta and OpenAI who bring both industry and deep technical specialization to our project deployments. These are the people who have built the infrastructure that is powering the AI wave and know it better than anyone. After bootstrapping Tribe AI since 2019, we decided to raise this capital because the market opportunity was simply too big. Even as we were reinvesting our profits back into the business, we still saw more demand than our capacity could support. We’re grateful to have met Bryce and have him believe in us and the opportunity we saw. We’re also extremely proud to have the major stakeholders in our business (our customers, partners and network of top AI engineers) invest in the round as well. We’re on a mission to help Enterprises realize the value of AI for their business, and we’re building a category defining AI company in the process. Read all about it 👇 https://lnkd.in/dYRDQDjp

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What comes after #Web3? My colleagues at Outlier Ventures -- with a massive shout-out to Jamie Burke and Jasper De Maere -- have launched a groundbreaking piece of research on what we’re calling the #PostWeb. Here are my top 7 takeaways from Chapter 1, which was just released: 1️⃣ The Post Web is the Internet’s Next Great Evolution The Post-Web combines #AI and #blockchain to create an internet that doesn’t just respond to users -- it actively works FOR them. It shifts from manual interaction to intelligent, intent-driven systems that fulfill user needs autonomously . 2️⃣ From Complexity to Simplicity #Web3 brought decentralization but has been way too complex for most people. The Post Web simplifies this by integrating AI to manage the technical details, enabling seamless, user-friendly experiences on a decentralized foundation. 3️⃣ The "Thin Web" and #IntentionEconomy Today's clutter of websites and apps fighting for your attention will become obsolete. The Post Web prioritizes delivering outcomes based on what you desire, shifting from the Attention Economy to the Intention Economy. 4️⃣ AI Agents Take Action on Your Behalf In the Post Web, AI-powered #agents autonomously interpret and execute your goals -- whether managing transactions or navigating systems -- allowing you to focus on bigger-picture, strategic decisions. 5️⃣ Trust Through AI and Blockchain The Post Web combines AI’s #adaptability with blockchain’s #security and #transparency, creating systems that are both intelligent and verifiable. #Trust is at the core of every interaction. 6️⃣ Hyper-Personalized, Context-Aware Experiences AI in the Post-Web delivers deeply personalized, #context-aware outcomes tailored to your unique needs in real time. 7️⃣ Fixing the Internet’s Biggest Problems The Post Web addresses challenges like monopoly control, data privacy breaches, #misinformation, and inefficiencies, building a fairer, more secure, and effective digital ecosystem for everyone. 🌟🌟🌟 This is just my attempt to frame some key points in the paper. To learn far more about this important research, please visit postweb.io. Would love to hear your thoughts on all that comes next! #Web3 #AI #blockchain #PostWeb #ThePostWeb #agents #autonomous

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In the next two weeks, the House of Representatives will vote on the most important piece of crypto legislation to date: FIT21. We’ve long called for regulatory clarity that protects consumers and innovation and the FIT21 Act will do just that. Americans have embraced digital assets, but the current regulatory approach too often limits innovation and privacy without actually addressing the solutions needed to protect consumers or tackle illicit activity. FIT21 will help stamp out scams, ensure oversight of crypto exchanges, and protect American consumers by implementing strict rules on crypto trading. FIT21 has bipartisan support because it tackles these issues. I encourage everyone who believes in the power of blockchain technology to support this legislation. The best thing to do is get in touch with your local representative and tell them to support FIT21. Stand With Crypto offers helpful resources to find and contact your local representative here: https://lnkd.in/gszyG_v5

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It’s a milestone day – announcing Portal Fund II, an oversubscribed $75M fund, dedicated as the first, only, and best crypto fund exclusively focused on leading pre-seed protocol businesses. For an encapsulation of our work, see Evan's post below. In this post, I’d like to take a moment to share a more personal note on the journey. Truthfully, it feels surreal to see my face on the cover of Fortune Term Sheet. If I could go back to my 15-year-old self—“fresh off the boat” to Canada, struggling in an ESL program—and tell her this would happen one day, she’d surely look at me with an eye roll. VCs, by nature, are pattern-seekers. And as I reflect on my own path, the dominant thread is “know what you want.” From my first day at business school, I knew venture capital was the one true career for me. It was the purest form of epiphany, where seemingly random fragments of my life piece across stages together for a strikingly obvious picture - from my days as a lively child TV anchor in China to a nerdy, taciturn high schooler in Canada leading the science club to the Physics Olympiad - from six years of mastering storytelling in management consulting to gaining insights from some of the most successful companies in web2 and web3 to now inform best practices for my portfolio companies - from designing the crypto course for Wharton, organizing the UPenn Blockchain Conference now three years in a row, to now the dedicated pre-seed focus, in which proximity to talent is a key ingredient. Once you discover what you want with an unyielding will and a “whatever it takes” conviction, it materializes. The real work is figuring out what it is that you truly want, then letting your passion guide you. Here’s mine: to create the future in the present day on crypto rails, and let’s do it together. This milestone would also not have been possible without the most astute thinker, trusted partner, and my Bo-le (伯乐), Evan Fisher. Here’s to a spectacular Fund II and many more funds to come! Big shoutout to Leo Schwartz for the insightful piece & coverage & Anastasia Loureiro Yury Molodtsov MA Family for the amazing work! Fortune Article: https://lnkd.in/gtUqNEGV Evan's post: https://lnkd.in/gPgK2Zx5 X Announcement: https://lnkd.in/gGe83QNK

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