Monthly Mint — 08.2022
A curated selection of hires and promotions from across crypto and web3. If you would like to sign up to receive this newsletter, please visit our website.
What We’re Following
In a continuation of the hangover following the crypto party that was last year😵…Galaxy Digital broke things off with BitGo and Ava Labs is in hot water with law firm and *alleged* evil accomplice Roche Freedman👺. Ouch. Maybe it’s time for some retail therapy💳 — wen Gucci?
After a little Pedialyte and a lot of Elton John x Britney magic✨, we have some hair of the dog that’ll get you back on the rocket ship in no time🚀 — enter Mr. Larry Fink. In the biggest double mic drop we’ve seen all year, BlackRock announced that not only is it swiping right on the Coinbase Institutional Prime platform, but it’s also launching a Bitcoin private trust for institutional clients. In the words of FTX, upvote⬆️!
Keeping the asset manager party going, VC firm Dragonfly Capital just acquired one of the oldest crypto investment funds of all time, MetaStable Capital. Oh and don’t tell Fidelity, but there’s a cool new crypto kid on the TradFi block — Rocketplace just raised $9M to build ‘the next generation asset management platform for crypto.’ Even the Brits💂 — BH Digital, to be specific — are raising the largest crypto hedge fund in history. Why yes, things are certainly heating up🔥. Did someone say Dracarys?🐲
In other news, a new “City” was born this month in the shifting sands and expansive angles of the Nevada desert. In the galaxies above🌌, our favorite Webb telescope is doing actual cartwheels (great party trick, btw). But back here in crypto land, we’re building stoke ‘Whaddup Council’-style for the long awaited Eth merge. Ba-dee-ya. We’re merging in September🕺✌️.
Who We’re Following
0x: Ash Ebersole joined as General Counsel. Ash was previously a Partner at Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner. Link
a16z: Ish Verduzco joined as Community Lead for a16z Crypto. Ish was previously the Head of Growth and Marketing at Crave It. Link
Aave: Jenny Pollack joined as Head of Product. Jenny was previously a security researcher at DappHubb.
Algorand Foundation: Devan Moorthy joined as Head of Ecosystem Access. Devan was previously a Senior Manager of Business Development, APAC at Ripple. Link
Binance.US: Nandini Maheshwari joined as VP, Business Development. Nandini was previously a Senior Director and Head of Business Development, APAC at Uber. Link
Blackstone: Adam White joined as a Senior Advisor. Adam is the former President and COO at Bakkt. Link
Block: Melissa Netram joined as Head of Bitcoin and Crypto Policy. Melissa was previously a Partner at FS Vector. Link Felicia Mayo joined as EVP of People. Felicia was previously the Chief Talent, Diversity and Culture Officer at Nike. Link
Circle: Spencer Spinnell joined as VP, Americas. Spencer was previously a Managing Director of Financial Services, Payments and Commerce Partnerships at Google. We’re grateful for the continued partnership of Jeremy Allaire, Elisabeth Carpenter and Kash Razzaghi on this search.
Coinbase: Lauren Novita was promoted to Director and Head of Executive Recruiting. Lauren was previously a Senior Executive Recruiter.
Dapper Labs: Nick Grudin joined as Chief Business Officer. Nick was previously the VP of Content and Community Partnerships at Meta. Link
Discreet Labs: Peter Abilla joined as Chief Business Officer. Peter was previously part of the Core team at Harmony. Link
Electric Capital: Jay Clayton, Kevin Warsh and Pratiti RayChoudhury joined as Advisors. Jay is the former Chairman of the SEC, Kevin is the former Federal Reserve Governor and Pratiti is the Head of Research and User experience at Meta. Link
Genesis: Derar Islim was appointed as Interim CEO. Derar was previously the Chief Operating Officer. Tom Conheeney joined as a Senior Advisor and Board Member. Tom is the former President at SAC Capital/Point72. Michael Patchen joined as Chief Risk Officer. Michael was previously the CRO at AQR Capital. Michael Patterson joined as Chief Compliance Officer. Michael was previously a US Compliance Risk Management Services Leader, Financial Services Office at EY. Matthew Johnson joined as Chief Technology Officer. Matthew was previously the CTO at Bakkt. Link
Offchain Labs: Andrew Saunders joined as Chief Marketing Officer. Andrew was previously the Global Head of Entertainment & Culture, XCM at Amazon. Link
Polygon: Marc Boiron joined as Chief Legal Officer. Marc was previously the Chief Legal Officer at dYdX. Link We’re happy to have partnered with the Polygon crew on this assignment.
Provenance: Valerie Wagner joined as Senior Director for Onboarding & Adoption. Valerie was previously the Director of Engineering at Figure. Link
Skolem Technologies: Henry Howell joined as Chief Revenue Officer. Henry was previously Head of Business Development at Nickel Digital Asset Management. We’re grateful for the partnership of JP Smith, Sean Pi and Henry Heeney on this search.
T. Rowe Price: Blue Macellari joined as Head of Digital Assets Strategy, Global Trading. Blue was previously a Managing Partner at Dunamis Trading. Link
Talos: Neal Pawar joined as a Strategic Advisor. Neal is the Chief Operating Officer at Quontigo. Link
TRM Labs: Slava Balter joined as Head of Partnerships. Slava was previously a Partnerships Lead, Apple, Microsoft, Spotify, Roku at Spotify. Link
Yuga Labs: Chris Fortier joined as VP of Product. Chris was previously the VP of Product at Rally. Link Danny Greene joined as Brand Lead for Meebits. Danny was previously the General Manager at MeebitsDAO. Link
Intersection Growth Partners builds the leadership teams for many of the most exciting crypto and web3 firms in the world. Our venture fund provides these firms with capital: yielding deep alignment and extraordinary outcomes.
