Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) partner Chris Dixon took first place in the Forbes VC ranking thanks to investments in the crypto industry.

How Chris Dixon’s Dive In The Crypto Rabbit Hole Made Him The World’s Top Venture Capitalist #ForbesMidas https://t.co/uJjQJdsvrp pic.twitter.com/3CxhAVu3OC

— Forbes (@Forbes) April 12, 2022

In 2018, the venture capital firm launched its first crypto fund with $300 million in assets. a16z has invested in bitcoin exchange Coinbase, crypto hedge fund Polychain Capital, and crypto custody service provider Anchorage.

On April 14, 2021, when Coinbase was directly listed, board member Mark Andriessen sold a total of 1.18 million shares, worth $449.2 million, with a venture capital firm and two related entities.

According to Forbes, Crypto Fund I had realized and unrealized gains of $6 billion in 2021. A source familiar with the fund’s financial performance noted an “impressive 17.7x return.”

In spring 2020, a16z raised $515 million in a second fund focused on the cryptocurrency industry. In June 2021, Silicon Valley’s leading venture capital firm launched Crypto Fund III with assets of $2.2 billion.

“My job is not to predict the future. My job is to be smart enough to know the smart people who will do it,” Dixon said in a commentary to the magazine.

The top three on the Midas List included Ribbit Capital Managing Director Miki Malka and Sequoia China’s Neil Shen. PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel, who heads the Founders Fund, took 10th place in the ranking.

In March 2022, a16z invested $70 million in staking service Lido Finance.

He previously supported venture capital firm Celo network’s crypto wallet, Syndicate’s DeFi project, developer of NFT games Mythical Games, Mysten Labs and others in investment rounds. a16z also holds significant stakes in Compound and Uniswap.

Recall that in January 2022, the media learned about Andreessen Horowitz’s plans to raise up to $ 4.5 billion in two new cryptocurrency funds.