Breed VC, led by sole general partner Jed Breed, has raised $15 million for its second cryptocurrency fund, targeting investments in startups at the “day zero”, pre-seed and seed stages.
The fund’s backers include FalconX, Hutt Capital and Arrington Capital, alongside Nic Carter of Castle Island Ventures, Rob Hadick of Dragonfly and Jake Brukhman of CoinFund.
Breed began fundraising last year and completed the process earlier this year, he told The Block. He said the decision to keep Fund II relatively small was deliberate, allowing the firm to prioritise investor returns rather than management fees from a larger pool of capital.
The size of the fund is also intended to help Breed VC secure what Breed described as “high-conviction deal access to competitive Tier-1 rounds”.
Despite its scale, the fund expects to invest between $250,000 and $750,000 in each startup. Breed said investments of that size give the firm “real skin in the game”. Each cheque represents roughly 2% to 5% of the fund, enabling Breed VC to work closely with founders while investing alongside lead investors.
A challenging fundraising environment
The fundraising comes as early-stage cryptocurrency investment faces increased pressure, with smaller fund managers finding it more difficult to attract capital.
Some larger firms have continued to raise substantial sums. A16z crypto announced its fifth fund, worth $2.2 billion, in May, while Haun Ventures announced $1 billion in new funds during the same month. Framework Ventures raised $400 million for its fourth fund in June.
Breed VC’s first fund, launched in 2023, is now fully invested and has started returning capital to investors, Breed said. He did not disclose its size.
Its portfolio includes Monad, Ethena, Exo Labs, Agora, MyPrize and Nous Research. Breed said the fund ranks among the top 10% of comparable 2023 venture funds according to Carta’s Q1 2026 benchmarks, although he did not provide specific performance figures.
Fund II has already invested in Silicon Data, which supplies pricing and performance information for AI computing; 3Jane, an onchain lending platform; M1X Global, which is developing blockchain-based sovereign debt; and USD.AI, a synthetic dollar protocol focused on financing AI infrastructure.
Breed said the second fund remains at an early stage of its investment period and is expected to deploy its capital over the next three to four years. Its focus will be decentralised startups, including open financial infrastructure and decentralised AI.
Before founding Breed VC, Breed was head of digital assets at Circle, where he helped launch USDC. He later led a crypto market-neutral fund at Accomplice VC.
The Boston-based firm currently consists of Breed and investment partner Nick Garcia. Breed said it is hiring, but did not specify the roles or number of positions.
He remains positive about the current investment climate, saying: “Tourist capital and mercenary projects have washed out, entry valuations have rationalized, and the founders building today are in it for the long term and focused on real problems that need to be solved.”
