석유 재벌 록펠러 가문이 운영하는 벤처캐피털 기업 벤록이 가상화폐 및 블록체인 기술 리서치‧자문‧투자를 담당하는 코인펀드와 파트너십을 체결했다. 록펠러 가문의 이번 투자는 투자 포트폴리오를 다변화하기 위한 것으로 알려졌다. 단기간의 이득보다는 분산원장의 잠재적을 보고 5~10년 사이의 변화를 지켜보겠다는 의도로 분석된다.
한편, 비트코인은 버블이라던 전통 투자가 조지 소로스(George Soros)도 암호화폐 투자에 나섰다.
거연 거물들의 가상화폐 투자가 꽁꽁 얼어붙은 시장을 녹일 수 있을까?
[ckefeller’s VC Arm Venrock Partners With Coinfund, Exec Highlights Focus On Long Term]
(https://cointelegraph.com/news/rockefellers-vc-arm-venrock-partners-with-coinfund-exec-highlights-focus-on-long-term)
Venrock, the official venture capital arm of the Rockefeller family, has partnered with crypto investment group Coinfund to support cryptocurrency and Blockchain business innovation, Fortune reported April 6.
Coinfund has recently added token-based financial services platform Coinlist, a spinoff of startup connection website AngelList, to the number of projects that it backs. Coinfund is also known for backing chat messenger app Kik, which raised almost $100 mln in the Initial Coin Offering (ICO) of its Kin token last fall. Fortune notes that Venrock and Coinfund met through their mutual investment in the live video streaming app maker YouNow.
When asked about Bitcoin’s (BTC) recent failure to strongly stay above $7,000, Venrock partner David Pakman told Fortune that the price of “a single currency over the next day, week, month, year” is not what they thought about when deciding to partner with a crypto investment group:
“We’re really patient long term investors [...] we’re wondering what happens over the next five to ten years. Can we have fundamental change to a number of different markets because of a disturbed ledger, a token economy that all participants can take part in?”
Major traditional investor George Soros, who had previously referred to Bitcoin as a “bubble,” will also reportedly be investing in cryptocurrencies, through the Soros Fund Management. In mid-February, Soros’s investment fund become the number three shareholder in Overstock, a retail company that accepts Bitcoin as payment and whose CEO Patrick Byrne is widely known for his pro-crypto stance.
[It Started With the Rockefellers. Now It's Taking on Crypto]
(http://fortune.com/2018/04/06/crypto-vc-venrock-coinfund/)
David Pakman, a Venrock partner, dropped by Fortune’s offices to share news of a partnership the firm just struck. Venrock is teaming up with CoinFund, a Brooklyn-based cryptocurrency investor group, to help entrepreneurs build businesses based on blockchains, the hot distributed ledger technology that first came to prominence with the development of Bitcoin a decade ago. Pakman spoke to Fortune’s Jen Wieczner and Robert Hackett about the joint venture on the latest episode of Balancing The Ledger, a new show about the intersection of money and technology.
“We wanted to partner with this team that has been making investments and actually helping to architect a number of different crypto economies and crypto token-based projects,” Pakman said.
Venrock and CoinFund first met through their mutual investment in YouNow, a live video-streaming app maker that last year became, perhaps, the second well-established startup to pivot to crypto. In the fall, Fortune broke news that YouNow had decided to host an “initial coin offering,” or ICO, whose virtual tokens would form the basis of a new, and untested, business model.
Pakman, who counts investments in Nest and Dollar Shave Club among his plaudits, says he is not interested in short term profits, despite the speculation-driven volatility associated with cryptocurrencies. “There are a lot of crypto traders in the market. There are a lot of cryptocurrency hedge funds. This is different,” said Pakman, describing the collaboration. “In fact, to us, it looks a little bit more like venture capital.”
[[가상화폐 이슈] 조지 소로스, 록펠러 가문도 암호화폐에 꽂혔다]
(http://www.insightkorea.co.kr//news/articleView.html?idxno=24011)
글로벌 대부호들이 암호화폐에 관심을 쏟고 있다. 헤지펀드 투자 귀재로 불리는 조지 소로스에 이어 ‘석유왕’ 록펠러 가문도 암호화폐 관련 투자에 나서기 시작한 것이다.
9일 블룸버그통신 등 해외 언론은 소로스 펀드 매니지먼트의 매크로 투자 담당자인 아담 피셔는 암호화폐 투자에 대한 내부 승인을 얻었다고 보도했다. 다만 아직까지 실제 투자가 이뤄지지는 않은 것으로 알려졌다.
[소로스부터 록펠러家까지…가상화폐 시장에 뛰어드는 월가 거물들]
(http://www.fnnews.com/news/201804091036581150)
말도 많고 탈도 많은 분야지만 가상화폐 시장을 향한 전 세계 관심은 여전히 뜨겁기만 하다. 최근에는 ‘헤지펀드 대부’ 조지 소로스 등 월가 거물들이 가상화폐 시장에 눈독을 들이고 있다는 보도가 연이어졌다.
월가 거물들의 잇단 가상화폐 투자기대로 시장 분위기가 되살아난 모습이다. 지난주 후반 6000선에 다가서던 비트코인 가격이 7000선을 회복했다. 8일(이하 현지시간) 오후 8시35분 24시간 전보다 1% 오른 7093.18달러에 거래됐다.