Which crypto sectors will benefit from Trump's election? Here's what more venture capitalists say

The crypto world has been a whirlwind over the past few days, with Bitcoin surpassing the $93,000 mark right after Donald Trump won the election. It was crazy to think back to 2018 when I first started writing about cryptocurrencies and saw Bitcoin was only around $3,000. But here we are, watching the future unfold.

I spoke with more than a dozen cryptocurrency VC investors, and while the excitement around Trump’s victory and Bitcoin’s rise is undeniable, most are sticking with their long-term plans. That said, some are adjusting their approach, paying closer attention to new trends and shifts in the political and market landscape.

“I think the industry is right to be ecstatic,” Lasse Clausen, a founding partner at 1kx , told me. “You have to be an industry insider to really understand the scale of the disruption to innovation that the previous administration caused. So outsiders still underestimate how many exciting products the industry will create now that founders are free to try again.”

Arianna Simpson, general partner at a16z crypto , echoed Clausen’s sentiments, noting that “the last few years have been challenging for the crypto industry.” However, she expects “significant shifts in policy” to greatly benefit web3 builders and companies.

Given the expected clarity on cryptocurrency regulation from the Trump administration, investors expect more founders to start getting involved in the web3 space. Earlier this week, Portal Ventures, founded by former Insight Partners investor Evan Fisher, raised $75 million for its second fund, which manages more than $80 billion in assets under management (AUM), which will invest exclusively in cryptocurrency pre-seed stage startups. Fisher told me that he expects repeat founders who previously sold their businesses and are sitting on hundreds of millions of dollars, but were hesitant to enter the cryptocurrency space due to legal and regulatory risks, to start entering the space now that the regulatory environment has removed the risk. "We're going to see senior founders start to enter the cryptocurrency space more," Fisher said.

Jake Brukhman, founder, managing partner, and CEO of CoinFund , told me that his firm is preparing for what he calls a “super cycle” in the crypto market. Brukhman said CoinFund is well-capitalized across its seed, venture, and liquidity investment programs, adding that the firm has expanded its investment team with six new hires this year, five of whom joined in the past two to three months.

Betting on Crypto AI, DeFi, and More

Looking ahead, cryptocurrency venture capital firms will focus on high-potential areas such as crypto artificial intelligence, DeFi, real-world asset (RWA) tokenization, infrastructure, stablecoins, and payments.

Many investors see the intersection of cryptocurrency and AI as the next game-changing trend. Ed Roman, co-founder and managing partner of Hack VC, describes crypto AI as “the undisputed sexiest category in crypto right now,” and envisions a multi-layered web3 AI stack that leverages the cost efficiencies of decentralized computing networks. “This is a multi-trillion dollar market when serving web2 clients,” Roman said. “AI is not a fad (like NFTs were). AI is creating real business value and may be the most important technology innovation since mobile phones and the internet.”

However, Roman said that the health of the crypto AI category depends largely on the health of the web2 AI category, which is inspired by NVIDIA. Therefore, Hack VC is closely watching NVIDIA as a "loose proxy" for crypto AI.

Balder Bomans, CIO and managing partner at Maven 11 Capital, also sees growth in crypto AI startups, particularly favoring the AI-driven DePIN protocol that provides compute for AI model training. CoinFund’s Brukhman added that most retail investors looking to gain exposure to AI will likely do so through cryptocurrencies next year. “AI coins are scarce, but in high demand. The summer of 2025 is the summer of decentralized AI (deAI).”

Another key focus for investors is the resurgence of DeFi as institutional adoption increases. Hack VC's Roman noted that DeFi has recently suffered from high interest rates, which makes U.S. Treasuries more attractive. However, Roman added that Trump's expected rate cuts could make DeFi more competitive against traditional financial (TradFi) instruments such as Treasuries. He sees DeFi as a "once-in-a-lifetime opportunity" to simplify finance.

Clausen of 1kx noted that TradFi institutions may now work on bringing RWAs on-chain and using DeFi infrastructure at scale. “Think about how bad trading, clearing, and settlement are in TradFi, while decentralized exchange (DEX) trading is 3-in-1 instant trading with no counterparty risk and no publicly verifiable exchange operator fraud,” Clausen said. “It’s like fishing with dynamite; it’s not even fair.”

Erick Zhang, managing partner at Nomad Capital and former Binance executive, also sees potential for DeFi growth, especially with renewed activity in altcoins and ongoing challenges facing centralized exchanges.

Will Nuelle, general partner at Galaxy Ventures, and Thomas Klocanas, general partner and head of venture capital at BlockTower Capital, also foresee expansion in DeFi, RWA tokenization, stablecoins, and the payments category.

“After Trump took office, it became clear that one of the biggest barriers to stablecoin adoption in the payments space — banking relationships to interface with fiat systems — became much easier,” Nuelle said. “We hope/expect that banks offering legitimate crypto services will not fear retaliation from the FDIC or other agencies, which should ease banks’ ability to integrate with what is clearly a growing use case.”

Consumer-facing applications and infrastructure categories are also gaining traction. “I’m particularly excited about the takeoff of consumer applications for crypto, as this category has been particularly adversely impacted by the policies of the outgoing administration,” said a16z crypto’s Simpson. “We remain very interested in DePIN and the ongoing infrastructure projects that are evolving.”

Alvaro Gracia, partner at Borderless Capital, also highlighted the potential growth in the DeFi and DePIN sectors as Bitcoin dominance shifts toward altcoins. Gracia, who manages a $100 million DePIN fund, remains particularly bullish on the category, noting that the fund still has about $70 million available to deploy over the next two to three years.

1kx’s Clausen added that infrastructure, middleware and consumer applications are focus categories for his company, particularly consumer applications that require bank integrations and which were previously hampered by regulatory restrictions.

Adam Winnick, managing director of Finality Capital Partners, expressed optimism about the infrastructure vertical, highlighting restaking and zero-knowledge technology startups as key areas of focus. Miko Matsumura, managing partner of Gumi Cryptos Capital, said he focuses on “middleware” infrastructure projects that aim to solve “normal people’s normal problems” rather than solving “crypto problems for crypto people.”

Meanwhile, infrastructure isn’t as exciting for some investors. Maven 11’s Bomans noted that the firm has shifted its focus to application-level investments over the past 12 months, as the rise of powerful monolithic chains and continued improvements in modular stacks have removed massive scaling bottlenecks.

Portal Ventures’ Fisher said his firm has been short on infrastructure projects, instead favoring commercial startups with clear distribution advantages and strong user demand.

Nomad Capital’s Zhang also mentioned that the firm is more cautious in the way it deploys capital in infrastructure projects, particularly layer 1 and layer 2 networks. “Most infrastructure projects are essentially ‘infrastructure memes,’ and their success often depends on the founding team’s ability to effectively manage narrative and brand,” he said. “However, the number of teams that can excel in this unique dynamic remains limited.”

Risks of a Trump Administration

While Trump’s presidency has brought new optimism to the cryptocurrency space, several venture capitalists warned of potential risks that could affect the industry’s trajectory.

1kx’s Clausen expressed concerns about Trump’s immigration policies, arguing that a reduced labor supply could lead to higher wages, which could be bad for risk assets like cryptocurrencies.

Galaxy Ventures’ Nuelle noted that if “Trump becomes too lax with the crypto industry,” it could repeat the failure of FTX. He said balanced bipartisan legislation and overall clarity about the status of digital assets will create the most stable long-term value.

Zhang of Nomad Capital stressed that the “Trump effect” could lose steam if bold proposals such as Bitcoin becoming a U.S. currency are made and strategic reserve assets fail to materialize quickly. He said unfulfilled expectations could dampen market enthusiasm.

Hack VC’s Roman also said that one of the most important unanswered questions is: Will the U.S. actively reserve new Bitcoin, or simply hold existing seized Bitcoin? Either outcome could be a win for cryptocurrency. Actively building a Bitcoin inventory, which could become a new standard, influence other countries and affect their policies, would be a more significant win for cryptocurrency.