Business
Auros Ventures to Invest $50 Million in Early-Stage Crypto Ventures
Auros Ventures announces a $50 million investment in early-stage crypto ventures, positioning itself as a key player in the evolving digital asset landscape.
Crypto trading firm and market maker Auros has revealed plans to invest over $50 million of its own capital in early-stage digital asset ventures over the next two years. The company’s newly established venture capital arm, Auros Ventures, will spearhead these investment efforts.
To lead the investment initiatives, Auros has appointed Julien Auchecorne as the head of Auros Ventures. Auchecorne brings with him a wealth of experience from his previous roles at hedge fund Brevan Howard and digital asset services platform XBTO International.
The announcement comes during a time when crypto VC investments have seen a resurgence in the first half of 2024, following a challenging period of capital scarcity after the collapse of firms like FTX in 2022.
Auros’ Recovery and Expansion
The expansion into venture capital marks a significant milestone in Auros’ recovery following the impact of FTX’s collapse in late 2022. Auros now estimates that it accounts for around 4% of the global crypto trading volume on exchanges.
Following the establishment of the ventures division, Auros has already invested in over a dozen projects and allocated close to $20 million in funding since the third quarter of 2023.
Strategic Investment Focus
The investments made by Auros include projects such as data provider Pyth, high-performance blockchain Berachain, as well as various infrastructure and decentralized finance (DeFi) projects.
Auros CEO Ben Roth emphasized that the venture capital arm aims to assist companies in scaling their operations, positioning Auros as a key user of their services. The firm seeks to build strategic partnerships with portfolio companies rather than using investments solely for client acquisition.
Investment Strategy
Julien Auchecorne outlined that Auros intends to make concentrated investments primarily in seed and series A stage projects. The focus will be on areas poised to attract the next billion of recurring users to the crypto space.
“We are not looking to scatter investments across the industry but rather make targeted bets in promising projects,” Auchecorne stated.