w3.wrapped 2024

GMGM and welcome to a special newsletter edition with a sweet ✨w3.group ecosystem recap✨.

w3.fund was launched more than two years ago, and now an entire ecosystem has grown up around it. Let's first take a look at the faces that drive our ecosystem forward.

Let me walk you through our incredible journey - the wins, the tough moments, and all the wild adventures we've had with our companies.

🌊 w3.wave
💰 w3.ventures
🧪 w3.labs
🏠 w3.hub
🔮 w3.vision x Blockstories
🗺️ Honorable Mention

w3.wave (part of w3.fund)

With w3.wave, we have launched a fully regulated liquid fund that can invest in any type of crypto token.

After more than two years of intensive preparation, it officially started on November 1, 2024. Led by Julius Nagel and Philipp Beer.

What makes our fund special?

💧 100% Liquid Portfolio: Targeting venture-like returns without long lock-up periods. Our liquid strategy allows for active portfolio management, while our open-ended structure gives investors full flexibility, with only a 1-year minimum holding period.

📈 Proven Track Record: Over 10 years of crypto investment expertise and a track record of outperforming Bitcoin, with early entries into leading projects like Ethereum and Solana.

📑 Tax Efficiency: Structured to offer 0% tax on trading proceeds before distribution, giving investors a compliant, tax-efficient way to invest in crypto.

💶 Over €3 Million Partner Commitment: Our founding team has committed more than €3 million of their own capital, underscoring our confidence and alignment with investors’ success.

State of the Crypto Markets

 The current cycle, which began in 2022, displays several similarities to previous cycles.

From a technical perspective, we are approximately halfway through the current cycle and maintain a positive outlook for the upcoming 14 months.

Crypto cycles are influenced by various factors:

• Global liquidity

• Business cycles

• Political environments

• Bitcoin halvings

• Crypto market structure

However, many of these factors are subject to constant change. Recent developments, such as the introduction of Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs, indicate a potential shift in crypto market dynamics.

Areas to invest

“The days of indiscriminate bull runs, where every altcoin rises regardless of fundamentals, are fading.” - Philipp Beer.

 Market Dynamics

• Market liquidity has returned

• Major assets (BTC, SOL, ETH) show stronger performance than most altcoins

• Returns are more dispersed across different assets than in previous cycles

Future Expectations

• Focus shifting to fundamentals and product-market fit (eg. Stablecoins)

• Many altcoins unlikely to reach previous all-time highs

• Selective assets with strong fundamentals will outperform (eg. “AI x Crypto”)

Investment Implications

This market environment requires a more selective and active investment approach as markets mature with institutional involvement.

AI Agents

One promising sector is agentic AI, autonomous systems that can perform complex tasks without human intervention.

Previous AI bots lacked the ability to transfer value in the existing financial system.

👉🏽 This is where the blockchain stack comes in, as it enables the same bots to have a native wallet and thus be able to invest and transfer assets on the blockchain.

With OpenAI expected to launch its AI agents in the coming month, we believe that Agentic AI will be a key topic across mainstream and investors in 2025, and crypto will certainly benefit from this attention.

Here you can delve even deeper into agentic AI.

w3.ventures (part of w3.fund)

The recent U.S. presidential election, resulting in Donald Trump’s victory, has sparked strong optimism in the crypto market.

Bitcoin surged to a historic high above $100.000, with Ethereum & Solana also seeing notable gains.

 Since we have established positions in BTC and ETH within our fund, these market developments have been positive for us too.

Portfolio Updates

Mento Labs: Driving Stablecoin Adoption in Africa

As stablecoin adoption surges across Africa, the Celo blockchain has emerged as the leading network for daily active stablecoin users.

Our portfolio company Mento is a platform that enables the creation and management of stablecoins on the Celo Blockchain, which are particularly needed in regions with limited banking services.

Recently, the Mento team connected with local communities in Nairobi to explore how stablecoins could support “chamas,” community lending groups that provide small businesses with secure, accessible loans via blockchain technology. 

At the Celo Gather Africa Conference, Mento highlighted its solutions, including the Celo Kenya Shilling (cKES) stablecoin, and joined discussions on bridging financial inclusion across Africa.

Unstoppable Finance [Iron]

Unstoppable Finance (recently rebranded as Iron Bank) is moving away from the traditional banking model and focusing on Iron as a universal API for forwarding money for a stable payment infrastructure.

This strategic realignment aims to simplify the fragmented and complex environment of stablecoins for institutional clients.

 This pivot is in line with broader trends in the financial sector, as underscored by Stripe's recent acquisition of the start-up Bridge for $1.1 billion for stable cryptocurrency infrastructure.

Stablecoins offer several key benefits for cross-border transactions:

- Low transaction fees (as low as 1–2 basis points)

- Instant settlement

- Reduced reliance on traditional financial systems

We are confident that stablecoin solutions for efficient cross-border payments will continue to become more relevant.

w3.labs

 After building Web3 infrastructure for ourselves, we are now in the final stages of making these infrastructure services available to everyone. 🚀.

As a collective of Web2 builders, Web3 natives, TradFi asset managers, we use our unique perspective on the problem and solution spaces around Web3 assets.

 💥 Investors in Web3 face numerous challenges: regulatory compliance, tax implications, bankability, and operational hurdles.

We will contribute to the ecosystem by building ourselves!

💡 Our solution: w3.labs embraces the open source nature of Web3.

We are building on bare-metal infrastructure in German data centers, offering non-custodial staking in full legal compliance, enabling confident tax reporting and adherence to German and EU regulations.

Our tooling supports the tracking and reporting requirements of authorities and institutions.

Insights from Staking Summit 🇹🇭

Tom and Pascal from our w3.labs team attended the Staking Summit (by Staking Rewards) in Bangkok.

The topic of staking became relevant for all crypto players at the latest when Ethereum switched from proof-of-work to proof-of-stake consensus.

Looking at the data, it is clear to see that more and more assets are being staked (this is not only true for $ETH).

Here is the key takeaway from the summit:

1. Bitcoin Layer 2s are the latest craze. Everyone was talking about them in Bangkok and various implementations are on the way or even already live.

🌶️ Quick add-on: Our devs are grinding non-stop to prepare everything for the official launch. Get ready for exciting news related to w3.labs in 2025.

w3.hub

 Our Co-Working & Community Space in central Berlin has experienced remarkable growth and transformation - in figures, I mean:

We started 2024 with 26 “OG” w3.hub members and passed the 100 active member mark in November.

Which represents a growth of over 280% within one year 🤯.

🤓 Quick Throwback

Started from the bottom...

... Now we're here.

We now have members from various ecosystems, such as Celestia, Solana, Cosmos, as well as pioneers from the art, gaming, and DePIN sectors.

Berlin Blockchain Week

What exactly is Berlin Blockchain Week?

Imagine it as Fashion Week, but for nerds. For a little more than 7 days, the Web3 community gathers in Berlin to host various types of events - from hackathons, meetups, brunches, workshops to community runs.

💅 Some Highlights

We kicked off the week with a Farcaster Frames Hackathon by Coinbase & Ledger.

Get some more Alpha here. 

Overnight Hackathon by Solana

The Solana Foundation team flew in especially for Blockchain Week Berlin to work with 65 selected developers on their ideas.

Celestia x Jägermeister x Google x w3.fund

Of course, our own event could not be missing and we saved that for the grand finale of the week.

We threw a party and toasted our wonderful community! 😎

Community Space Opening

After months of back-to-back upgrades, we officially opened our Community Space (on the 4th floor) in August.

There are now many more comfortable seating areas.

May I introduce you to our Gaming Corner featuring Arcade Machine, Playstation 5 & more 😎.

Our friends from Jägermeister collaborated with us to create the ambiance.

They have been involved as house partners with w3.hub since the very early days and we are happy to bring this space to the Web3 community together.

Meet the builders - great stories of our w3.hub members

Wondering what kind of people work in our co-working space?

Over the past 12 months, I have introduced you to a few of our members and shared their stories with you.

If you haven't met them yet, here is an overview for you:

Nusha - The most amazing DJ in Web3

Heinrich - How he managed to become 13 years younger (biological age)

Oli - The guy who sold his gaming company for $160 million

Daud & Viet - The story of the first product built at w3.hub

Aleks - One hackathon at w3.hub changed his life

Nick - Our DeSci OG

Three Event Highlights

Circle at w3.hub

During their roadshow, Circle stopped in Berlin to host an exclusive developer workshop for the local community.

Circle’s CEO, Jeremy Allaire, who shared his experience in Berlin and discussed what’s on their roadmap for the next 5 years.

Ledger Anniversary

Ledger turned 10 this year and celebrated its anniversary with the local Berlin Web3 community.

The day began with a hands-on developer workshop, where participants explored the latest Ledger products and developments.

In the evening, we gathered for an intimate afterparty with great music, delicious food, and a few lucky winners who went home with a Ledger device!

💅 I had the chance to record a podcast with Ian Rogers, Ledger's Chief Experience Officer.

He told me how he is combining his past at Apple Music and LVMH with the future of Ledger, the most prominent Web3 hardware product.

Executive Dinner

In December, Solana invited 30 executives from a wide range of brands such as automotive, entertainment, fashion, esports and insurance to a unique dinner experience here at w3.hub.

Dinners like this go beyond aesthetics; they create the perfect atmosphere to talk about challenges and opportunities that will shape the future of Web3.

In total, we organized or co-hosted over 130 events, most of which took place in 2024 🔥.

w3.vision x Blockstories - Digital Assets Season

Last but not least, we are in the process of giving you a thrilling start to 2025 by launching the Digital Assets Season, aka Europe's Largest Educational Campaign On Digital Assets.

We combine our expertise with that of Maximilian Vargas from Blockstories.

Why you should attend if you are seriously interested in digital assets

We’re in the third inning of digital asset adoption. For an increasing number of banks and enterprises, the question is no longer what to build on blockchain rails, but how to do it

• Buy vs. build?

• Public vs. private networks?

• Expanding into new markets or growing existing clients?

• And, critically—what should the tech stack really look like?

From January to February 2025, 8 leading industry partners invite you to a 10-week immersive season dedicated to exploring the most crucial themes shaping the future of digital assets.

👉🏽 You will meet us at the biggest financial hotspots in Europe: Zurich, London and Frankfurt.

Meet our first batch of partners

With a vision to become the “One-Stop Liquidity Provider” for crypto and tokenized assets, we’re thrilled to announce tradias as a partner for our upcoming Digital Assets Season!

👉🏽 Starting this January, we’ll dive into how institutions are leveraging tradias’ expertise to provide their customers with seamless access to digital assets.

Solana

Everyone knows Solana as the fastest-growing public blockchain, aiming to operate at Nasdaq speed.

In the last 6 months, it has also attracted significant institutional interest.

PayPal has expanded PYUSD to Solana, and Société Générale is using EURCV, to name just two examples.

Over our campaign, we'll dive deep into how institutions are leveraging the Solana network to build new financial infrastructure and products.

Fireblocks

With thousands of institutional clients, Fireblocks is an absolute powerhouse in the digital assets industry.

We’re thrilled to leverage Fireblocks’ expertise to dive deep into enterprise-grade infrastructure for digital assets!

Near

While chain abstraction enables any Near account holder to sign transactions across any blockchain, the Crypto x AI initiative positions Near as the foundational layer of a user-owned internet in the AI era.

We will discuss how companies will use blockchain technology and how tools like Chain Signatures significantly reduce complexity.

Kiln

According to a recent Blockworks survey, 69.2% of institutional investors stake their ETH to generate additional reward - many relying on Kiln.

Kiln will cover innovations such as restaking and bitcoin staking, helping companies unlock new reward opportunities for institutional investors.

TL;Dr: We’re focusing on real strategies and case studies from pioneering institutions—no high-level fluff.

Honorable Mention: Berlin Map

It's a wrap – thanks for your attention!

On behalf of the entire w3 team, I would like to thank you for all your support and wish you happy holidays!

Catch you in the new year, LFG!

💅 Vicky

My team and I have built a Web3 ecosystem in Berlin to help integrate blockchain into everyday life and solve real-world problems.

On the Onchain Culture Podcast, we explore how Web3 is transforming industries and who’s driving the change.

🎤 Check out the most recent episode

Don't miss out on any news, updates, & vibes anymore. Discord is so yesterday. Let's meet on Telegram.

👉🏽 Join now