@soonaorlater Several factors in reviewing a white paper:
1) Is this a marketing paper or a technical paper?
2) Is this pitch solving a technical problem that needs to be addressed?
3) Is there a need for the token to exist? What is the utility of the token?

@eriktorenberg 1) Reputation among the early Crypto adopters, specifically the technical advisors and what they have to say about any particular manager
2) Past investments demonstrating skin-in-the-game. So not just someone who's been a "thought leader," but someone who has actually invested in the space.
3) Founder-market fit. Is the person best suited for the type of investment strategy they're pitching. e.g. someone pitching a deep technical diligence strategy should have in-house team members who are qualified to evaluate protocols while someone pitching a trading approach should have a background in trading commodities or cryptocurrencies.

@NeilDeramchi I'm interested in "altcoin" themes:
1) Platform Cryptocurrencies (e.g. ETH, Stellar, etc.)
2) Decentralized Exchanges (0x, Kyber, etc.)
3) Privacy coins (e.g. Monero, ZCoin, & ZCash)

@Harry-Garrett The 0X ecosystem and the ICOs working to build out an alternative to centralized services for Crypto investors.

@ljxie Institutional investors often fall into 2 buckets: those with crypto experience and those without. For the newbies, I spend time discussing the core tenants on blockchain technology such as distributed ledger, decentralized protocol, mining, tokenization, etc. Then, we discuss the practical applications for blockchain technology and what that means for the future of many industries, etc. For those investors that are experienced, the questions are more specific around fund strategies, tax implications, tokens vs equity, etc.

@avichal haaaa

@avichal hahaha - for some context, Soona and Erik T hosted an awesome crypto dinner last week. We started with an ice breaker of rock/paper/scissors... and somehow I won! My strategy was to go with paper because everyone seemed to want to smash with their rocks. Maybe the dip in crypto last week played a part. ;-)

@NeilDeramchi I look at it in a similar way to how I assess angel investments. You do a deep dive on the quality of the team, the market need that project addresses, the ability to scale and the competitive situation. Specific to crypto, you also look at the realistic need for a token (for an ICO). Of course, you can also look at secondary signals such as the quality of the investors and advisors.

@Ben-Lang I have to start with my good friend Naval Ravikant, especially since he got me started in crypto about 4 years ago. He is a true leader in the space and huge advocate for the community. Next, Vitalik as the founder of Ethereum, which could be a hugely important platform for crypto to rise to the next level. He is incredibly smart and a true visionary. And a tip of the hat to Satoshi!

@Alessandro-Giordo check out binance too!

@Alessandro-Giordo One of the exchanges with the most available alt coins to trade is Bittrex. I use/like them. In terms of research, I would look at emerging alt coins that have a clear use case, scalability, a solid team behind them and strong support from the developer community. Please be aware that some alt coins are very thinly traded so there could be a meaningful discount when you try to sell. The upside for certain coins may be higher than BTC or ETH... but I think a balanced portfolio makes sense.

@stanleyhataria I like technical teams that have a asymmetric understanding of the applications for blockchain technology. I like teams that not only dissect the white paper but actually get into the codebase in assessing an ICO. In a diversified approach like we have with Protocol Ventures, I also like fund managers with a financial background such as Ari Paul at BlockTower. I think that could be increasingly important as Wall Street infrastructure comes into play in 2018 with BTC futures / derivatives.

In terms of the best teams, there are many. Obviously, Ethereum. Also, Stellar, 0X and ZCash. And many more!

@zack415 Zack knows that I'm a huge Boston sports fan. The Pats are killing me with these come-from-behind wins. I'm on the edge of my seat for 90% of the game.. and then they comeback again. I think the Eagles will be tough. Should be a great SuperBowl. Go Pats.

@bentossell My friend Naval Ravikant fell down that rabbit hole first. We had dinner about 4 years ago and got into a discussion about the technology and potential applications and it was fascinating. I felt like I was back in 1993, when I first realized the opportunity for the Internet. I feel like we are right there today with blockchain. Not everyone sees the vision yet (like Internet in 1994) but the opportunity is huge and it's still super early days. So much more to come!

@eriktorenberg I started by investing in crypto directly. Then I realized that it's really hard because crypto trades 24/7 and half the trading occurs in Asia (Korea and Japan, formerly China) so doing this on my own would be really hard. I also realized the issues around custody. I also started to see how the best hedge fund managers have informational advantages which could drive huge returns. For all of those reasons, I decided to move my crypto capital to funds like Metastable and Neural Capital. Once I started to diversify my own crypto holdings across funds, I realized there was a need in the market for a fund of funds model. There are 200 crypto hedge funds now and trying to do the research and get access to them is difficult for most people. I was already doing that work for my personal investments... so I decided to institutionalize the idea and create Protocol Ventures.

@eriktorenberg Well, this is harder than most people realize. Researching and trading crypto is the fun part. But all of the administrative tasks in running a fund are difficult and distracting. Such as the fundraising, accounting, administrator, taxes, IR, etc. It's far more work than most traders realize. And the biggest part of that is fundraising - it's a huge distraction which takes you away from the fun stuff for you.. trading! Please know what you are getting into when you make the move from independent trader to professional hedge fund manager.

@MARAOHORO The crypto market is highly volatile. It grew from an aggregate market cap of $17B on 1/1/17 to about $600M today which is 30x in a year! There will be plenty of wild swings, up and down, in this asset class for a while. A lot of this still centers around FUD, especially around regulation -- Korea, SEC in US, Germany/France, etc. If we had more clarity on all of these issues, the crypto market might stabilize which probably means lower potential for these huge returns in the short term. That said, we need to get there on clarification on regulation. Right now, most of the gov't agencies are still trying to figure it out and then make informed decisions. That is probably the right approach.

@eriktorenberg We are targeting high net worth individuals and family offices that want some exposure to crypto assets. We offer a diversified approach so a single LP investment immediately gets exposure to a basket of the best hedge fund managers in crypto. We believe this is a smart approach to gain exposure to an existing but volatile asset class.

@kartik-mandaville In an ICO, the timeline could be several months to a year or more. In those cases, it's a bet on the team, utility and scalability. If all of those factors line up, then I would be willing to wait a year. But in this dynamic market, I don't want to wait too long as things seem to be highly accelerated right now. This is a time to run, not walk!