Daniel

coo, gc, and partner @hack_vc

my views are my own and do not represent those of Hack VC

[Mike Katz @mikekatz29]

Binance lost $6.3B Thursday night and traders priced the North Korean hack in 24 hours. But today is a seismic Election Day that crypto hasn’t priced at all.

Tonight or early tomm the Dems take the House (pending meteor strike). And against all odds from even two months ago, the Senate is anywhere from a coin flip to 80% Dem depending on whose model you trust (thanks FLIPR @NateSilver538 ).

The friendliest Congress crypto has ever had starts to evaporate Wednesday morning. But it’s crickets from the market on this. Everyone still trading in crypto is shell chocked and desensitized but it actually matters twhat is coming from the results tonight.

Crypto spent ~$170M on this election, $154M of it through Fairshake and its affiliates, with the biggest checks aimed at keeping Republicans in power. If you’re long COIN, USDC, HYPE, or anything that runs on the last 18 months of political and regulatory goodwill, you’ve hedged a record hack but not the coming blue wave/tsunami/name your ocean phenomena.

CLARITY died in the Senate in September, with Democratic objections focused in part on the president’s family crypto holdings. If it doesn’t move in the lame duck, it starts over in a Congress with no political pressure to pass it.

GENIUS is law. The OCC finalized its rule last month; 13 more remain pending from Treasury, the FDIC, the Fed the NCUA and others. Do you think the banks will wait around or leverage the new political climate to undermine this innovative law? The new Congress can’t unwrite the statute but they can make life hard for the people implementing it.

Oversight is the part I’d be watching most closely.

Our old friend Maxine Waters likely gets back the House Financial Services gavel (unless Casten or Foster takes it from her). Warren (sigh) gets Banking if the Senate flips, and a returning Sherrod Brown (no thanks to Fairshake's extensive opposition) may be sitting next to her.

They’ve already told everybody, in writing, what they want to investigate:

• Trump Family Crypto Deal. The $2B MGX investment in Binance using World Liberty’s USD1, the separate UAE-backed purchase of 49% of World Liberty, and what the SEC’s fraud case against Binance could have proven. Waters tied the hack to the CZ pardon under 24 hours from the news.
• The SEC dismissal list. Waters, Casten and Sherman wrote Atkins in January naming cases against Binance, Coinbase and Kraken, plus Justin Sun, and told the SEC to preserve its records. A ranking member asks and gets ignored but a committee chair has subpoena power.
• Grift stuff. The memecoin dinners, the insider trading, the randomtoken pumping.
• The Regulatory approach. All the no-action letters, proposed rules, and exemptive relief of the last 18 months, and the SEC and CFTC retreat from crypto enforcement.
• Perps and Predicitons: The CFTC’s aggressive interpretation of federal preemption and control over nationwide prediction markets has a political bullseye on it. Along with perps. Senate Ag has its own oversight jurisdiction and whoever takes the gavel will come knocking. Coinbase said prediction markets are a $200M+ annualized business. Does that number survive a antagonistic House and Senate committees?

So where’s the hedge??

Two theories.

The market thinks the rules that matter are already written, or being written by regulators who won’t stop because Congress changes hands. A Democratic House can investigate and hold some entertaining hearings. It can’t undo the agenda.

Or the incoming Democrats, including some Fairshake-funded ones, decide crypto is a jobs issue rather than a Trump issue and go find something else to be mad about (AI, affordability, Iran war, etc).

My view: the rules are going to get written either way and Atkins and Selig are true experts focused on making real progress BUT traders are underpricing or ignoring the upcoming onslaught from an empowered Blue majority. The trick is to make the new rules stick enough to survive the coming onslaught. Tell me why I’m wrong.

[anand iyer @ai]

Asking a VC to sign an NDA was, for years, a signal that you didn’t get venture. That signal has inverted as of late. Early-stage deals built around any proprietary IP are now regularly arriving with NDA requests.

[Mike Katz @mikekatz29]

The epidemic of vibe lawyering is going to cause some problems. A friend recently typed the details of an employment dispute, including things he did in violation of his non-compete, into ChatGPT and asked it to draft a separation agreement. He did not talk to a lawyer first. He created a discoverable record of his own liability that lives on a third party's servers. He is very much not the only one. I wrote about why this is a real problem, and what a federal court just confirmed about it.

[Mike Katz @mikekatz29]

Got a lot of messages from VC and fund manager friends and clients after yesterday's thread on the paradigm shifting SEC guidance (thank you). The #1 question: what does this actually mean for my portfolio and my next deal?

Wrote a deep dive on that. Key points in this thread, full piece linked below.

[Daniel @dbulaevsky]

Perfect summary of a big developement @mikekatz29

[Mike Katz @mikekatz29]

The SEC just released the most important piece of U.S. crypto regulatory guidance ever produced. 68 pages. 148 footnotes. A 5-category token taxonomy. Safe harbors for staking, mining, wrapping, and airdrops. And a separation doctrine that changes how every token deal gets structured.

Initial takeaways in this thread. Full analysis in my article below.

[hdahmΞ 🛡️ @IsTheBaron]

Dear blessed algorithm, please show this most excellent @hack_vc #NeurIPS happy hour invite to good people solving the hard problems in AI x {trust / verifiability / attribution / adversarial environments / heterogenous hardware / compute constraints} with cryptography and vibes™

https://t.co/ljIfsMZDsy

[Hack VC @hack_vc]

Heading to sunny San Diego for #NeurIPS next month? 🌞Join us for an informal happy hour! Space is limited, so be sure to RSVP.

[Hack VC @hack_vc]

Last week, we hosted our 2025 Annual General Meeting in NYC.

A thesis-driven AGM from a thesis-driven firm, we brought our investment theses to life through conversations with the top founders, policymakers, and industry leaders shaping crypto’s next decade.

Agenda & highlights below 👇

[Hack VC @hack_vc]

“Hack has been one of our most value-added investors, and part of that is Harrison.” - @justsayuluvjo 🫶

Thanks to @soon_svm for hosting our Partner & CTO @IsTheBaron to talk market trends, supporting founders, and the path from builder to investor. 🎧👇

[Daniel @dbulaevsky]

@scarneck70 Do Reich and Luck not see this stuff before the games?

[Daniel @dbulaevsky]

@StanfordFanSdc Could start by having close games with good teams and not SJ State..

[Hack VC @hack_vc]

1/ AI will shape the future. The question is whether that future will be closed and centralized, or open, verifiable, and user-owned. We’re betting on the latter.

That’s why we led @0G_labs’ pre-seed in 2023 (and the seed last year). 👇

[Daniel @dbulaevsky]

@GoMightyCard Yeah, and the ball clearly did a 360 spin while he was landing out of bounds, but they said he had control. How does that make any sense?

[Daniel @dbulaevsky]

@GoMightyCard It’s a bad combo with our young line..

[Daniel @dbulaevsky]

@FO_wordofmuth 50% dirt ball rate makes that unlikely..

[hdahmΞ 🛡️ @IsTheBaron]

I’m joining @hack_vc as Partner & CTO to help and back serious builders solve the hard, meaningful problems that lie between AI and crypto 🦾

[Hack VC @hack_vc]

1/ @Hack_VC is about to make a splash in Seoul 🇰🇷 Sept 22–25. Nonstop event activations, founder lunches, late nights & early mornings.

@0xRodney, @hsinju, and @herbiefu from the Hack VC team will be on the ground. If you plan to attend KBW and want to jam, ping us.

Here's what we have cooking 🧵

[Hack VC @hack_vc]

1/ Hack VC is so excited to announce that we’ll be hosting hack.summit(“Seoul”) on Sept 22 during @kbwofficial at Josun Palace. We’re bringing together top founders, KOLs, and market movers. If you’re in Seoul and want REAL alpha, this is where you’ll find it—a high-signal, curated crowd.

😉: the first 100 ppl who register will be entered into a raffle to earn 1 free KBW ticket. There will also be other surprises for attendees later as well (shhhhh).

RSVP now: https://t.co/D4sHIuDhEo

[Hack VC @hack_vc]

Hack VC is pumped to re-launch the Proof of Work newsletter — now with a fresh spin for the Crypto × AI era. Readers will get monthly updates and intel straight from the top projects building in the space.

💫What shipped in the last month
💫What’s live
💫What insiders are working on

Our First Issue:
https://t.co/bBFfT34LST

[Jigar @jshah321]

Are you ready to join a team where innovation, collaboration, and fun go hand in hand? We’re looking for brilliant minds and great people to grow with us. If you’re searching for a place that challenges you, supports your goals, and celebrates success—this is it.