Author | BruceLLBlue

Recently, Twitter has been buzzing with a wave of Chinese KOLs showcasing their posts about "how much they earned in the past year": millions, tens of millions, 102.4 billion (don’t run away from the joke)…… After reading, all I can say is, impressive! But as a former VC investment head (GP, General Partner), I just want to complain: after a few years as a Crypto VC, I lost tens of millions of dollars. This isn’t just casual talk; it’s a genuine tale of blood and tears—over 3 years, 55+ investments, 27 losses (including rugs), 15 went to zero, and I also invested in 9 leading VCs.

All NFT-related projects went to zero, GameFi had a 33% rug pull, and Infra was a disaster zone, with many projects left with only 10%-20% of their valuation. To the KOLs flaunting their income and esteemed Crypto traders, congratulations on catching the secondary windfall; what about ordinary VCs focused on primary investments? They’re stuck licking project teams; unlocking takes 3-4 years, and the result is often “invested early, invested correctly, but can’t exit.” Why show losses instead? Because this isn’t about crying poor; it’s a wake-up call. Being a Crypto VC is inherently difficult; bear markets are brutal, and bull markets see project teams “harvesting” profits. However, I believe that in this new cycle, continuing as a VC (or evolving it) may not be the best timing. Although institutional capital is entering, regulations are clearer, and AI + on-chain tools are reshaping exit paths, I think there are better ways and paths to realize self-worth. I’m sharing my hard-earned lessons for everyone’s encouragement.

Lesson One: The Naked Truth of the 55 Deals' "Win Rate"

From joining Crypto VC in August 2022 to leaving in July 2025, I personally handled 55 direct investments + invested in 9 funds.

Rugs accounted for 14/55 (25.45%): The disaster zone was NFT projects, all went to zero. One “star project” backed by a major IP had a booming early NFT phase, but the team had shallow Web3 experience, and the founder, a top celebrity, showed little interest in issuing tokens. After core members left, it soft rug pulled; another “music + Web3” project, after years of work from a major player, achieved nothing and quietly fizzled out. There was also a Dex project’s “executive entrepreneurship dream”: the founder had the team do black market work while pocketing the income, and core employees ran away; several “potential stocks” from a university lab basically all failed.

Losses accounted for 28/55 (50.1%): One GameFi project, after launching at 5x, ended up in shambles (remaining 20% of cost, down 99%); another “produced by a North American big company” GameFi project peaked at 12x, now only 10% of cost; another GameFi project was heavily impacted by a CEX’s Launchpad dumping many tokens, leading to its demise. The Infra sector was even worse: no breakthroughs in ecology, no innovation in technology, and after the hype, many were left with only 10% of their cost; without timely hedging, it would have been a total loss; additionally, a MOVE ecosystem socialfi project collapsed right before the 2024 bull market.

What about the fund investments (FoF, mother fund)? I invested in 9 leading European and American funds like @hackvc, @Maven11Capital, @FigmentCapital, @IOSGVC, and @BanklessVC; these funds participated in early investments in very well-known projects during this cycle, such as @eigenlayer, @babylonlabsio, @MorphoLabs, @movementlabsxyz, @ionet, @altlayer, @MYXFinance, @solayerlabs, @ethsign, @0Glabs, @berachain, @initia, @stable, @monad, @etherfi, @breviszk, and @SentientAGI. On paper, it looks decent with 2-3x returns, seemingly respectable, but the actual DPI (distributions to paid-in capital) is estimated to be only 1-1.5x. Why such expectations? The main reasons are slow project unlocks and poor market liquidity; if a bear market or a collapse like FTX occurs, positions can instantly bleed out.

Lesson Two: The Depth of Pits, the Depth of Human Nature — Several Tragic Cases That Moved Me

The most heartbreaking is the “investing in people” failures: a Dex project where the founder, despite having a CEX executive halo, actually outsourced work to the team, pocketing the income; GameFi’s “North American big company dream” saw a 12x launch followed by a continuous decline, with prices never recovering. A project from a founder of @0xPolygon in the Infra space has seen ecological breakthroughs remain elusive, with only 15% of the investment’s valuation left; several hot Infra projects launched on the Korean giants (Upbit and Bithumb) and then plummeted, never rising again. There was even a “music NFT” project where the founder was a Tencent Music executive, who after a few years soft rug pulled, achieving nothing.

VCs in the Chinese-speaking region suffer more: language/thinking patterns/resources are inherently disadvantages; the playbook of Western funds is fundamentally different—they compete on scale to earn management fees, while we are shortsighted with Quick Flips and Paper hands. Well-known projects, after raising huge funds, seek global outsourcing to implement their roadmap (I’ve encountered a few; as long as the money is sufficient, it’s fine), while founders only need to manage the community and raise funds. What about VCs? The most disadvantaged group, with some project teams dumping tokens through airdrops, trading via USB drives and Korean exchanges (the price is driven up to the target price at launch, and then profits are shared, which is why Korean exchanges often see opening premiums), investors have no way to verify. Every VC thinks they are impressive; checking the IRR and DPI of these funds shows it’s better to just do fixed deposits in USDT/USDC.

Lesson Three: After Losing So Much, I Learned the Evolutionary Theory of "Exit is King"

Being a VC is genuinely tough; you have to survive bear markets, gamble on human nature, see through people, and wait for token unlocks without holding any coins. A 3-4 year cycle repeats, and without hedging/liquidity management in the secondary market, achieving excess returns is nearly impossible. From my summary, most projects that achieved excess returns were invested in during the late 2022-2023 period after the FTX collapse, primarily because: project valuations were low, founders had strong beliefs, and the timing of investment was right (projects had enough time to explore and could conduct TGE early when the bull market arrived). Why did other projects perform poorly or lose money? The main reasons boil down to: either too expensive, too early, or misaligned unlocks.

Reflecting on this, these are valuable experiences! Moreover, with $BTC continuously hitting new highs, traditional giants and Wall Street are rushing in, the window for ordinary people to get rich is slowly narrowing, and institutional investment returns are aligning more with Web2 venture capital (it’s hard to return to the wild growth era before 2021).

The new generation of investors: they may not necessarily be VCs; they could be individual angel investors or super KOLs who, through their influence and resources, can often secure better unlock terms and more favorable tokens than VCs. Furthermore, it’s not just about investing early and correctly; it’s about capturing the entire chain: primary + secondary + options/convertible bonds + airdrop interactions + market-making hedging + DeFi arbitrage. In fact, there is a serious cognitive misalignment and difference between the East and West, which is also a gold mine for arbitrage.

Turning to the Keyboard, the Dignified Path of Outputting Alpha Through Content

Losing tens of millions in my Crypto VC years has made me realize one thing: constantly licking project teams, enduring token unlocks, and gambling on human nature leads to the humble label of “VC dog” and the buried grievances of backers, while project teams can secretly dump tokens, and investors can only watch helplessly. Enough! Now, I choose to turn around and start writing articles: relying on daily keyboard work to output industry insights and alpha insights, no longer entangled in waiting for project unlocks, but directly laying out strategies and capturing project opportunities. Compared to the passive waiting of VCs, this path is more dignified, freely outputting value, with compounding being the trust and shares of readers.

Ultimately, through these years of experience, I finally understand: patience > opportunity, luck > expertise, FOMO = suicide.

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