VNTR Newsletter Dec 1, 2024 – Venture Capital News, Events, VC Reads
Venture Capital, Web3, and Private Equity – News, Events, and VC Reads
Hello friends,
Happy Sunday!
VNTR Newsletter is delivered to 100k+ investors and subscribers weekly to share the latest news, events, and articles from the global VC and startup ecosystem.
Scroll down to discover VNTR Community News, Upcoming Events, and the latest VC News and Reads.
VNTR COMMUNITY NEWS
Spotlight
Meet us offline: join us at the upcoming offline events as part of our series of over 130 events in 2024:
Munich - Dec 4 VNTR Investor Roundtable side event to ISPO Munich
Paris - Dec 5 VNTR Investor Roundtable inside event at CC Forum Paris, the leading global conference laser-focused on investment in sustainability. The roundtable is hosted by Yuri Rabinovich, founder at VNTR. Sponsorship packages are available. Secure your CC Forum passes with our exclusive discounts:
VNTR100EXEC: Complimentary General Pass
VNTR20VIP: 20% discount on a VIP Pass
Miami - Dec 6 VNTR Investor Roundtable side event to Art Basel Miami. Sponsorship packages are available.
Abu Dhabi - Dec 11 VNTR Investor Roundtable side event to Global Family Office Investment Summit (request invite) and Abu Dhabi Finance Week. Sponsorship packages are available.
Seed round: We are finalizing a $1m seed round to scale VNTR to 50+ chapters in 2025 and grow the VNTR community to 10k+ community members, closing by Dec 19. Interested investors can join via VNTR Syndicate or contact Yuri to discuss.
VNTR Roadshow Bahrain: Join us to explore Bahrain's startup and venture ecosystem from Jan 14 to 16, where we will connect with the key local VC ecosystem players, sovereign wealth fund, and family offices and explore Bahrain. The number of spots is limited to 30 VNTR Club members, VCs, angels, and family offices. Apply to join the Roadshow on VNTR or contact Elise.
Academy: Dec 10 VNTR Expert Session with Gomining - We partnered with Gomining to unveil the secrets of Bitcoin Mining. This Expert session will cover the fundamentals of Bitcoin as an investment asset class and provide a clear understanding of Bitcoin mining and its role within the broader Bitcoin ecosystem. By looking into the business model of Bitcoin mining, the current state of the industry, and the essential question of whether to mine or buy Bitcoin, this session provides practical insights for investors aiming to navigate this dynamic sector. Attendees will also receive valuable guidance on how to invest in Bitcoin mining strategically and capitalize on this growing asset class for sustainable long-term growth and diversification.
Christmas Speed Networking: Join us on December 18th for a festive end-of-year celebration and an opportunity to network with 100+ investors. Engage in dynamic one-on-one speed networking sessions, each lasting 5-7 minutes, to build meaningful connections as we wrap up 2024.
.vntr domains: Get your .vntr domain name (40% discount using VNTRWINTER code)
Annual Corporate Partnership: Discover our annual corporate partnership packages to connect with the fast-growing VNTR global investor community in 2025.
VNTR at Davos WEF 2025: This January, VNTR is bringing the global VC community together in Davos during the World Economic Forum for the 4th time with an exclusive series of three high-impact events designed to foster connections, insights, and opportunities among leading investors.
VNTR Podcast: Tune in on YouTube, Spotify, and Apple. Stay updated with our latest episodes, and subscribe on your preferred platform to never miss insightful discussions.
Partner Podcast: The VC Playbook: "AI Agents Are Eating the World!" Tess Hau on Spotting Unicorn Startups. "AI agents are going to eat the world," says Tess Hau, founder of Tess Ventures, in the latest episode of the "Web2+1 with VC" show by Violetta Chekan.
VNTR Fellowship Program: In 2025, VNTR is expanding its chapter network to over 50 cities worldwide. To support this growth, we are onboarding Chapter Directors who will participate in a 5-week intensive fellowship program designed to equip them with the skills and tools needed to lead thriving regional VNTR communities.
Contact Irina to apply for the January 2025 cohort. The ideal candidates are entrepreneurs looking to break into venture capital, become investors, and serve as super connectors in their local VNTR chapter community. Be part of this transformative program and take the next step toward becoming a leader in the Venture Capital ecosystem while driving innovation and collaboration in your region. Joining the VNTR team involves a minimum two-year partnership commitment to build and expand the chapter while successfully implementing VNTR services within the local community.
What You’ll Learn and Practice:Building and nurturing vibrant communities
Establishing strategic partnerships
Understanding venture capital fundamentals
Fundraising and syndicating funds
Managing club memberships effectively
Planning and executing impactful events
Securing sponsorships
Launching a local chapter VC fund
And more
Follow us on Social media: Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, Flickr, and X.
UPCOMING VC EVENTS
Dec 3-5 ISPO Munich, Germany
Dec 4-7 CC Forum, Paris, France (VNTR100EXEC complimentary General Admission pass, VNTR20VIP for 20% discount code for a VIP pass)
Dec 9-12 Abu Dhabi Finance Week, UAE
Dec 10-11 Global Family Office Investment Summit, Dubai, UAE (Request invite)
Dec 10-11 World AI Summit, Doha, Qatar
Jan 7-10 CES, Las Vegas, USA
Jan 15-17 CFC St. Moritz, Switzerland
Jan 16-18 DLD, Munich, Germany
Jan 20-24 World Economic Forum, Davos, Switzerland
Feb 3-6 4YFN, Barcelona, Spain
Feb 4-6 AI Everything Global, Dubai, UAE
Feb 5-7 Techchill, Riga, Latvia
Feb 9-12 LEAP, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
Feb 18-20 Consensus, Hong Kong
Feb 23-26 Web Summit Qatar, Doha, Qatar
April 14-16 GITEX Africa, Marrakech, Morocco
April 23-25 GITEX Asia, Singapore
April 27-30 Web Summit Rio, Brazil
April 30 - May 1 Token2049, Dubai, UAE
May 12-13 Dubai FinTech Summit, Dubai, UAE
May 14-16 Consensus, Toronto, Canada
May 21-23 GITEX Europe, Berlin, Germany
May 27-30 Web Summit Vancouver, Canada
June 11-14 Viva Technology, Paris, France
If you would like to submit VC-related events, please get in touch with Yuri or Telegram @byuric
VC Reads and News
View curated VC news and articles on the VNTR Platform
SoftBank Vision Fund Dashboard
This quarterly dashboard tracks trends in deployment and performance for SoftBank’s Vision Fund segment.
These Smaller State Startup Scenes Saw Big Gains In 2024
Vermont, Hawaii and Arkansas aren’t on the short list of states likely to serve as home to the next Silicon Valley contender.
However, by one measure worth watching — increased venture funding — these are all geographies on the rise.
Per a Crunchbase News analysis, startup investment in a majority of U.S. states is on track for an annual decline in 2024. While overall U.S. funding is up, the flood of dollars to AI-focused companies that has driven the rise remains heavily concentrated in California.
Secondaries fever has hit fintech - but only a few companies are in demand
Europe’s later-stage fintechs are increasingly opting to raise funding through secondary share sales — but not all companies wanting to sell can find buyers to buy.
In August, Revolut kicked off the secondaries fever by raising an employee share sale — a type of secondary deal which sees equity-holding employees cash in on their stocks — that secured the company a $45bn valuation.
Investment platform Moneybox and UK neobanks Monzo and Tide followed suit, also doing secondary transactions in recent months.
But market demand for secondary shares favours the larger and already profitable companies, meaning it isn’t a viable option for earlier-stage companies.
Play It Cool: Chasing Heat vs. Being Contrarian in Venture Capital
We hear often that venture capital is built on being contrarian. After all, venture is predicated on the power law: a small number of investments will drive most of the returns. This is a business of outliers.
StepStone and Primary crunched the numbers and found that both “good” and “great” performing funds have loss ratios around 50%. In other words, every 1 in 2 investments will return less than 1x.
Mullet Capitalists
Mullet Capitalists are a new wave of firms with a traditional “boring” business in the front and a venture bonanza in the back. They represent an intriguing rebundling of the VC product at a time when the broader asset class reckons with a potential “extinction event” that may cull more than 50% of managers.
Whether Mullet Capitalism outperforms classical emerging managers will take a decade or more to discover. But in the meantime, I think we’ll see many new versions of it crop up and subtly change the venture landscape. It also serves as a viable alternative model for insurgent managers to consider.
VC funding rises 44% to $9.2 billion in the first 10 months of 2024
Indian startups secured $9.2 billion in venture capital (VC) funding in 984 deals between January and October 2024, marking a 44.4 per cent increase in funding value from the year before, according to data analytics firm GlobalData.
Deal volumes rose 5.8 per cent during the same period, indicating a renewed investor confidence in the market. The same period in 2023 saw 930 VC deals worth $6.4 billion.
How to get rich (without getting lucky) by Naval
Naval’s iconic Twitter thread on building wealth is a must-read for anyone striving to create enduring success. Here’s the full thread, with an explanation of each point.
PE mega-funds make a comeback
A new divergence in PE fund performance has appeared: Funds above $5 billion beat their smaller-sized peers in recent returns, after reversing five consecutive quarters of underperformance for the category on the heels of the pandemic.
A closer look shows PE funds sized between $100 million and $5 billion logged a rolling one-year IRR of 7.9% through the end of Q1 2024, underperforming their larger counterparts for the third quarter in a row, per PitchBook’s latest US PE Breakdown.
In comparison, funds above $5 billion have rebounded from their Q4 2022 low to return 8.8% over the one-year horizon to Q1 2024.
India, already an IPO bright spot, prepares for bigger surge in 2025
India has bucked the global trend in initial public offerings this year, establishing itself as a rare bright spot for tech listings while other major markets face continued headwinds. The world’s most populous nation is now preparing for an even more substantial wave of startup IPOs in 2025.
More than 20 startups are preparing to list next year, according to multiple sources familiar with the plans. These include business-to-business marketplaces Inframarket and Zetwerk, farm-to-produce venture CaptainFresh, professional services marketplace UrbanCompany, jewelry retailer Bluestone, security firm OneAssist, and offline-to-online retailer Magicpin.
The Beauty Of Bootstrapped Companies: Why More Entrepreneurs Should Aspire To Stay Self-Funded
In the world of startups, the allure of venture capital often overshadows the virtues of bootstrapping. Recent exits of bootstrapped companies — like Text Request’s acquisition by Commify, Syft Analytics’ sale to Xero, and Silo.AI’s exit to AMD — highlight the power and potential of staying self-funded. These examples underscore why more entrepreneurs should consider bootstrapping as a strategic choice, not as a fallback, focusing on sustainable growth which can become effective in times of trouble.
Stablecoins Could Grow to 10% of U.S. Money Supply: Standard Chartered and Zodia Markets
Stablecoins could grow to 10% of the U.S. money supply and foreign exchange transactions once the sector becomes more legitimized, Standard Chartered (STAN) and Zodia Markets said in a report Thursday.
Currently, the stablecoin market is equivalent to 1% of U.S. M2 and 1% of foreign exchange transactions, the report said.
EU to demand technology transfers from Chinese companies
Brussels is planning to force Chinese companies to transfer intellectual property to European businesses in return for EU subsidies as part of a tougher trade regime for clean technologies.
New criteria requiring Chinese businesses to have factories in Europe and share technological knowhow will be introduced when Brussels invites bids for €1bn of grants to develop batteries in December, according to two senior EU officials. The pilot could be rolled out to other EU subsidy schemes, they said.
The requirements, while at much smaller scale, echo China’s own regime, which pressures foreign companies into sharing their intellectual property in exchange for access to the Chinese market. The criteria could be subject to change ahead of the tender, officials said.
5 Interesting Startup Deals You May Have Missed In November: Stronger Plants, Better Protein And Longer Lashes
The holiday season is upon us and everyone’s busy.
That means it’s pretty easy to miss some of the more intriguing rounds that get announced. No matter. We have you covered as we take a look at recently funded startups doing everything from fighting climate change to riding on the moon to longer lashes through AI.
Hong Kong follows US to propose crypto tax breaks
The Hong Kong government plans to exempt private market investors from paying taxes on their gains from cryptocurrency trading as it seeks to take on rival Singapore as Asia’s dominant crypto hub.
The proposal, which was seen by the Financial Times, will be subject to a six-month consultation. The government said taxation is one of the key considerations for asset managers and wanted to create a conducive environment for them.
The suggested change comes after US President-elect Donald Trump also proposed the elimination of capital gains taxes on cryptocurrencies issued by US companies.
Australia PE growth deals hit record high
It has been a banner year for PE growth deals in Australia.
Growth investments in 2024 have totaled $6.5 billion, according to PitchBook data through Monday, already surpassing last year’s total of $5.44 billion and making it the best year yet for the category. Deal count is on par with last year’s total at 61.
Moreover, growth as a share of overall PE investment has been on the rise in Australia since 2021, jumping from 4.7% to 17.4% and surpassing the previous high of 15.8% seen in 2015.
How Startups Can Raise Capital In Low Liquidity Markets
Venture capital has grown out of Silicon Valley and become global by default, mirroring the industry that receives the majority of its attention: tech.
Fund managers in the U.S. and Europe still dominate the headlines, but quietly (and in fact increasingly noisily) other investors in emerging markets are honing their craft in contrasting circumstances.
Only about 1% of global venture capital is currently deployed in Africa, which raises an interesting question: How should an increasing number of tech founders on the continent go about raising capital in a low liquidity market?
Tokenization can transform US markets if Trump clears the way
Tokenization can revolutionize the United States financial markets, but flawed rules have stymied adoption. Crypto-friendly President-elect Donald Trump has a historic chance to lead the way and change things.
Ending America’s cryptocurrency crackdown is an excellent first step, but it doesn’t go far enough. For tokenization to thrive, Trump’s team — including his potential crypto czar and Commodity Futures Trading Commission chair — must reinvent old rules, combining the best aspects of traditional markets and decentralized finance (DeFi).
Decline in VC dealmaking for European crypto intensifies
European cryptocurrency startups are heading for another disappointing year of venture capital dealmaking, but new regulation could give the sector a boost.
With just over a month left in the year, VCs have invested €1.7 billion (around $1.8 billion) in European crypto startups, according to PitchBook data, with deal value expected to land at around €1.9 billion for the year. This would represent a decline of 26.9% from last year and only a third of the amount invested during 2021’s peak.
Meet the startups bringing green thermal batteries to market
The industrial sector engages in some of the most environmentally destructive processes that exist. But over the last few decades, there’s been a huge surge in companies and investors targeting greener solutions to industries like construction, steelmaking and chemical processing.
One answer is renewable thermal batteries, a relatively young technology that harnesses and stores renewable energy—often in carbon blocks or molten salt—to power industrial operations.
In 2023, thermal battery startups raised over $170 million in venture funding, and are on pace to more than double that in 2024, according to PitchBook data.
Crypto thrives in India despite ‘discouraging’ taxes
Cryptocurrency adoption has been thriving in India despite the government implementing “discouraging” crypto trading taxes, according to the local community.
India, the biggest global economy in terms of crypto adoption, according to Chainalysis, levied a 30% tax on crypto gains and a 1% tax deducted at source as part of its Union Budget 2022.
More than a year since rolling out the “draconian” taxes in April 2022, India’s crypto community has shown resilience to harsh taxation requirements, with its crypto ecosystem gaining momentum, although not at its full potential, according to local market observers.