In Dragonfly partner Haseeb's eyes, who is the greatest VC in crypto history?

Original Title: LPs sometimes ask me who I think the best VC investors in crypto are.

Original Author: Haseeb Qureshi, Dragonfly Partner

Original Translation: Gu Yu, ChainCatcher

LPs sometimes ask me who I think the best VC investors in crypto are.

I often ponder this question.

Ever since I started in crypto venture capital, I've always aspired to be among the best. I'm deeply competitive, and investing itself is a pure competition. In the end, only one person can win the trade, and only one person can predict the winner of the cycle.

But when you look closely and analyze, you find that three people have already proven themselves to be the GOATs of crypto venture capital.

That might sound a bit off-topic (it is), and uninteresting to non-crypto investors. But I'm one of them. So, this article is written for all those who have made investing in crypto their life's work.

Third Place: Dan Robinson (Paradigm General Partner and Research Lead)

Sutter Hill Ventures General Partner Mike Speiser incubated Snowflake, turning it into a $75 billion company, a legendary story. The ability of a VC to create such massive value for portfolio companies is truly unheard of.

Dan Robinson is the Mike Speiser of crypto.

Dan has time and time again been involved in the development of several groundbreaking companies in crypto. He was there from the inception of Uniswap, co-authoring and co-founding Uniswap V3, which later became the cornerstone of on-chain spot trading. He was also an early key contributor to Flashbots, which birthed modern MEV auctions. Additionally, he was an early research contributor to Plasma (the precursor to Rollups) and led the seed round investment in Optimism as a result.

Dan is a true polymath. He broke the mold of traditional venture capitalists. Initially a securities lawyer, he later self-taught his way into becoming a protocol architect and mathematician, and is now a self-taught investor. Perhaps one of the smartest moves Matt Huang ever made was hiring Dan. We often miss out on deals because of Paradigm, usually because people would say, 'Yeah, you guys are great, but sorry, I have to work with Dan.'

The scariest investors are those who don't just invest. Dan has seen the direction the entire industry is heading and has rolled up his sleeves multiple times to push it forward himself. This has made him one of the greatest investors of all time and earned him a place on the Mount Rushmore of crypto.

Runner-up: Chris Dixon (a16z Partner)

Chris Dixon is a cryptocurrency OG. He saw the potential of cryptocurrency earlier than anyone else. Prior to Chris, cryptocurrency venture capital was still a niche field.

He was the first to publicly enter the crypto space and mainstream venture capitalist to bet his career on it. He was the first to bring the language of venture capital into cryptocurrency and web3 investment. He was also the first to bring these concepts into Silicon Valley and its LP circles. Many of the concepts we discuss internally every day are borrowed directly from Chris. It is no exaggeration to say that I am following in the path that Chris first laid out for himself.

I believe Chris Dixon orchestrated two of the most important deals. The first, of course, being Coinbase. In 2013, when the crypto industry was still nascent and everything was unclear, Chris led Coinbase's Series B funding. This deal epitomizes Dixonism — 'what the smartest people do on the weekends, everyone else will do in ten years.' He astutely made this deal and then doubled down, going all-in on the industry. When Chris was first doing these things, what we are doing now was much harder.

The second deal was Uniswap. Nearly everyone who saw Uniswap's Series A funding passed on the investment (Uniswap's final valuation was only $1 billion at the time — still relatively small). We were in the midst of intense debates about whether AMMs were capital efficient enough, prone to too much adverse selection, and easily forkable. Paradigm passed (although they led the seed round), we passed, and as far as I know, other members of the a16z investment committee didn't want to participate in the deal either.

But what about Chris? Word has it Chris said, "A smart contract that can buy and sell anything? That sounds too cool. Who knows what could happen — let's give it a try." He was right. That was indeed cool. With the advent of permissionless AMMs, all sorts of unexpected things will happen. Skipping the Series A funding round taught me a profound lesson.

In many ways, I disagree with a16z's view. But everyone in this industry should express sincere respect for Chris. Single-handedly, he more effectively than any other venture capitalist propelled the cryptocurrency industry to its current cultural status. He has dedicated his life to advancing cryptocurrency in Washington, D.C., and legitimizing it, ultimately winning cultural acceptance as a positive cutting-edge technology. Much of the language we now use around cryptocurrency directly stems from Chris.

If it weren't for Chris's early staunch support, cryptocurrency venture capital wouldn't have the achievements it does today. For that, we sincerely thank him.

And this brings us to the top-ranked venture capitalist in history...

First Place: Kyle Samani (Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Multicoin Capital)

Kyle, Kyle, Kyle.

I often tease Kyle. He always manages to annoy a lot of people — including me. It's been like this all along.

But investing is like a sport. In the end, you either score, or you don't.

And Kyle's score is the highest of all. The enormous profit he made from the Solana seed round investment, and the efforts he put into that deal, will one day be written into a book, and I'll definitely frown throughout my reading.

You see, the best investors are contrarian investors. And Kyle is a true contrarian investor. Being a contrarian investor does not mean you write a hot article that gets a lot of people saying, "Wow, that's so clever." If everyone wants to retweet your tweet, then by definition, you are not a contrarian investor. You know you're a true contrarian investor when you annoy others. When people think you're a fool. When they think you're burning money.

Kyle is one of the few true contrarian investors in the cryptocurrency space. I almost disagree with all his views. But his initial investment and his unwavering conviction in holding Solana through the FTX meltdown unquestionably make him the greatest venture capitalist in cryptocurrency history.

We often say that venture capital follows a power law distribution. Kyle and his legendary Solana investment is a perfect example of this law in action. Sometimes, all it takes is one successful investment.

And that's exactly why Kyle has become the greatest cryptocurrency venture capitalist in history.

So, that rounds out my top three.

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LPs sometimes ask me who should be at the top of this list.

Despite my high self-assessment — and I am indeed quite arrogant — I don't believe I make the top three. I'm sure I'm top ten material, maybe even top five, but I'm definitely not at the level of any of those three. I hope that one day, before my career is over, I can surpass them. If you go season by season, there are certainly some seasons where I outperformed each one of them.

But overall? Those three are the best ever.

I don't give props to competitors often, and there's no love lost between me and Dragonfly. But there's a deeper meaning to the game. You see, it's really hard to be an investor in this space — most of the peers I've started with haven't made it. Crypto is cutthroat.

And I compete with them every day, but I have nothing but respect for them. I've seen them grow throughout the ups and downs of the past decade. We've weathered the storms of crypto, supported founders, supported the industry, and helped it compete with any other tech. As the end of the year approaches, I feel it's worth giving credit to them because in this industry, venture capitalists are rarely praised.

Whether they realize it or not, each one of them has done a lot for me. I've learned so much from each of them. I genuinely hope they're proud of what they've accomplished.

Dan Robinson saw it coming. Chris Dixon saw it early. Kyle Samani saw it through.

Salute to all. May the competition be fiercer in the new year.

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