DeFi @ FTC

Alternative - Platform for non-dilutive SMB financing options by leveraging the API economy and DeFi

Bottlepay - A next-generation bitcoin wallet with support for frictionless payment rails on top of the Lightning Network

Boto - A platform for creating no code bots and actions in crypto

Centrifuge - A decentralized network connecting global supply chains to DeFi financing

Coincover - Digital asset deposit and theft insurance for business and retail investors

CoinLedger - Crypto tax and portfolio software for DeFi and NFT power users

Coinshift - Crypto treasury operating system for DeFi companies and DAOs

Dharma - A smart-contract wallet with regulated fiat on / off ramps and DeFi integrations

GLIF - Protocol deploying staking pools to Filecoin, creating a simple and flexible way for storage providers to utilize the network and borrow from multiple capital providers without fracturing liquidity

GoGoPool - Decentralized staking protocol for Avalanche and Subnets

MetaStreet - Liquidity routing and scaling protocol for NFT-backed lending markets

Nifty Apes - NFT lending protocol built for scale via perpetual auctions

Playgrounds - Data pipelining infrastructure for on chain data

Rainbow - Building a better home for your Ethereum assets

Revert Finance - The go-to analytic tool for managing liquidity positions within DeFi

Secured Finance - Building the yield curve for crypto capital markets

The Graph - An indexing protocol for decentralized data

Stables - A digital wallet that taps into DeFi to offer competitive yields on savings deposits

UMA - UMA enables anyone to build decentralized financial products

Violet - The identity protocol for DeFi

Other select investments in blockchain include lead checks into:

Axoni - Replatforming post-trade capital markets with DLT

NYDIG - Bitcoin-as-a-service for asset management, banking, payments, and insurance

Minka - Real-time payments infrastructure in Latam

FTC's DeFi strategy is thematic and fundamentally driven - investing in the infrastructure, protocols, and applications that support decentralized finance.

We are currently actively investing across themes that include smart contract wallets, programmable asset management, decentralized exchanges, synthetic assets, streaming payments, KYC’d liquidity pools, and the overall institutionalization of the asset class.

Read more on our thesis here: Decentralized Finance is a Continuum (February 2019) - Outlining the emerging DeFi ecosystem and our early thesis in the space

We are active participants in the decentralized networks in which we invest - designing, building, voting, and providing liquidity alongside the teams we back.

Sean Lippel - Partner and Head of Digital Assets

• Former world-ranked poker player
  
• Early user of Bitcoin (2012), Ethereum investor (2016) and prolific user of crypto applications
• Fintech venture investor since 2015, specializing in digital assets and alternative credit
• Investment banking and structured products @ Credit Suisse
• Columbia Business School MBA, University of Michigan BBA
  
• Medium @SeanLippel, Twitter @seanlippel

William Starr - Technical Lead

• MobiHacks SF Competition - 1st place winner
• UAE GovHacks Global Competition - Top 10 finalist
  
• Cofounder @ Timeless, a calendar as a service marketplace
• Cofounder @ Paper, a blockchain system to unify the modern supply chain
  
• Blockchain developer @ Eco (Expa) @ Pledgecamp
• Github @williamstarkro

Parker Jay-Pachirat - Head of Community

• Founding member of Boys Club, a social club & DAO onboarding the next 1m women into Web3
• Chief of Staff @ Fintech Today, strategic advisor and consultant to CEO
• Intern @ Unovis Asset Management, Impulsum VC
• Top 10 finalist & participant in Seed Club S4 Accelerator cohort; specialized focus on incentive design, mechanism design, and DAO tooling/infrastructure
• Twitter @parkerjayp

• A Framework to Think About "Institutional" Players Within the Crypto Ecosystem (September 2023) - A thread by DeFi General Partner, Sean Lippel, on an approach to segmenting the market players and how they engage with the asset class
• ​​Recapping ETHCC 2023 (August 2023) - Parker Jay-Pachirat recaps her attendance of the largest annual blockchain conference in Europe
• stETH Depegging: A Case Study of Cascading Events (August 2022) - William Starr and Liang Wu, Web 3 Research fellow at HBS, look at Lido’s stETH token as a case study to shed light on what we can learn from cascading events
• Buidling our Web3 Future (April 2022) - Fresh from participating in the ETH Denver hackathon, building 2 hacks, and winning the DeFi track, William Starr reflects on what is next for building in web3
• DeFi: Where We Are Today And Where We Go From Here (February 2022) - 35 part Twitter thread blending memes and what's top of mind for FinTech Collective's DeFi team
• Former Professional Poker Player Helms New $50 Million DeFi Fund Backed By BIllionaire Alan Howard (August 2021) - Feature article by Forbes highlighting FTC's new DeFi strategy
• Real Vision: Mapping the Future of DeFi (July 2021) - A new perspective on the many facets of DeFi
• The Future of Institutional Asset Management Has Arrived (October 2020) - Why we led the $50m equity round into NYDIG
• DeFi: A Conversation with Sean Lippel (November 2020) - Part of the FinTech Collective podcast series
• BetaWorks: NFTs and DeFi Curated by FinTech Collective and Coinfund (December 2020) - How decentralized finance is reshaping assets, ownerships, and digital content. Password: NFT121120VIP.
• Decentralized Finance is a Continuum (February 2019) - Outlining the emerging DeFi ecosystem and our early thesis in the space