VanEck Ventures into Early-Stage Fintech with $30M Fund
Global investment management firm VanEck has taken a significant step into the venture capital arena with the launch of VanEck Ventures, a $30 million fund focused on early-stage investments in fintech, digital assets, and artificial intelligence (AI) startups. This move marks VanEck’s strategic expansion into the venture capital space, building on its history of identifying transformative investment opportunities.
The fund, which will target pre-seed and seed-stage companies, is led by industry veterans Wyatt Lonergan and Juan Lopez, both former leaders at Circle Ventures. Their experience in successfully investing over $50 million in early-stage companies ranging from infrastructure to consumer applications positions VanEck Ventures as a potentially valuable partner for emerging innovative startups.
VanEck Ventures aims to make between 25 and 35 investments, with check sizes ranging from $500,000 to $1 million. The fund’s investment philosophy focuses on supporting exceptional teams building at the application layer while maintaining an infrastructure-agnostic approach. Key investment themes include tokenized assets, internet-native financial marketplaces, and next-generation payments building on stablecoins and tokenized capital markets.
Jan van Eck, CEO of VanEck, emphasized the fund’s alignment with the firm’s long-standing investment philosophy: “From pioneering an approach to gold investing in 1968 to recognizing the disruptive potential of Bitcoin in 2017, embracing a long-term view on transformative opportunities has always been part of our investment philosophy. This fund extends that vision into the early-stage venture space.”
The launch of VanEck Ventures comes at a time when the convergence of fintech, blockchain, and AI technologies is creating new opportunities in the financial sector. Wyatt Lonergan, General Partner at VanEck Ventures, highlighted three inflection points core to their investment thesis: stablecoins emerging as an open-source banking layer, the commoditization of blockspace, and AI breakthroughs.
Juan Lopez, also a General Partner at VanEck Ventures, noted the potential for stablecoins to enable seamless, large-scale value storage and transfer, comparing their composability to that of Linux. He expressed excitement about the growing regulatory clarity surrounding on-chain utilities focused on programmability and compliance.
VanEck Ventures has already made four investments, yet to be announced publicly. The fund is open to both equity and token projects, reflecting the diverse nature of innovation in the fintech and digital asset spaces.
