In this episode of Inside the Hutt, Brooke Pollack interviews David Gan, founder of Inception Capital. David discusses his journey from investment banking to crypto, including his time at Huobi and the launch of Inception Capital. He breaks down Inception’s two-pronged model—a venture fund and a fund of funds—highlighting their early-stage strategy, cross-border support, and commitment to backing emerging managers. The conversation also explores tokenization, Asia's evolving crypto landscape, exchange listings, and how David's experience and global network help founders scale across markets.

David Gan’s professional background and time at Huobi.

Founding Inception Capital and its evolution from Huobi Capital.

Structure of Inception’s two funds: early-stage venture and fund of funds.

Strategy behind taking GP stakes in emerging managers and scaling them.

David’s investment focus on infrastructure, financial services, and tokenization.

Insights on helping U.S. startups expand into Asia and vice versa.

Overview of key Asian crypto markets: China, Korea, Japan, Vietnam, Indonesia, and Singapore.

Commentary on China’s restrictions and Hong Kong’s role in regional crypto.

Geographic differences in crypto product development between Asia and the U.S.

Tokenization trends, regulatory progress, and increased global access to financial products.

Growing founder activity in New York’s crypto ecosystem.

The importance of exchange listings and the evolving landscape of centralized vs. decentralized platforms.

Current token valuation dynamics and the impact on venture investing.

Community-driven public token sales like MegaETH’s conviction round.

Early traction and developer activity in the MegaETH ecosystem.

Investment highlights in projects like World Capital Markets

Framework for backing emerging fund managers and criteria Inception looks for.

Advantages of smaller, nimble funds and strategic synergy with Inception’s core strategy.

David’s alternate career dreams and how poker introduced him to Bitcoin.

Links

David on Twitter: https://x.com/DavidGan1818

Inception Capital: https://www.inception.capital/

Brooke Pollack on X: https://x.com/bhpollack

Brooke Pollack on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brookepollack/

Hutt Capital: https://www.huttcapital.com/

In this episode of Inside the Hutt, Brooke Pollack interviews Jim Parillo, Managing Partner of Figment Capital. Jim shares his unconventional journey from CPA and tax advisor at KPMG to leading an early-stage crypto venture fund. They explore the evolution of Figment Capital from its infrastructure-focused roots to its current emphasis on application-layer investments. The discussion covers Jim's investment philosophy, thoughts on emerging infrastructure trends, navigating ecosystem bets, and his views on overrated and underappreciated areas in crypto today. Jim also highlights portfolio companies he's excited about and reflects on lessons learned building the firm.

Key Points From This Episode:

Jim Parillo’s background, starting in tax at KPMG before transitioning to Figment Capital.

The origins and evolution of Figment Capital from a validator-aligned fund to an independent early-stage VC.

Strategic shift from infrastructure to earlier-stage application-layer investments in fund two.

The team’s approach to investing primarily at the pre-seed and seed stages.

Insights into portfolio construction and avoiding mandate creep by focusing on private, early-stage deals.

How Figment Capital assesses ecosystem risk when backing applications on emerging L1s and L2s.

Discussion on valuation dynamics and deal flow advantages in emerging blockchain ecosystems.

Reframing what "infrastructure" means today, with focus on middleware and liquidity-enabling tools.

Examples of innovative infrastructure bets like Predicate and liquidity tools for prediction markets.

Views on overhyped trends (e.g. hyper-gambling) vs. underappreciated ones (e.g. long-term wealth creation).

Reflections on the effects of degeneracy culture and short-termism in crypto investing.

Key lessons for emerging managers: team importance, process discipline, and avoiding idea-over-team bias.

Portfolio highlights including Monad, MegaETH, Fact Machine, Euphoria, Legend Trade, Fastlane, Pair Protocol, and Asula.

Links

Jim Parillo on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamesparillo/

Figment Capital: https://www.figmentcapital.io/

Figment Capital on X: https://x.com/FigmentCapital

Brooke Pollack on X: https://x.com/bhpollack

Brooke Pollack on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brookepollack/

Hutt Capital: https://www.huttcapital.com/

In this episode of Inside the Hutt, Brooke Pollack speaks with Jesse Walden, founder of Variant, a seed-stage crypto investment firm. Jesse shares his journey from founding Mediachain to launching Variant, highlighting his focus on the ownership economy and regulatory clarity in crypto. He explains Variant’s barbell strategy of early-stage and liquid investing, insights on vertical integration, and their team’s legal-forward approach. Jesse also covers evolving opportunities in DeFi, NFTs, and why he believes crypto is still early in its adoption cycle—especially in the U.S. market.

Key Points From This Episode:

Jesse Walden’s background, founding Mediachain, and transition from Spotify to A16Z.

Founding Variant and its origin as a seed-focused crypto fund with a distinct ownership thesis.

Variant’s evolution, team structure, and strategic decision to remain lean.

Importance of legal and regulatory infrastructure, including internal policy expertise.

Original ownership economy thesis and how it’s held up over time.

Regulatory shifts in the U.S. and potential impact of the market structure bill.

Founder behavior in anticipation of upcoming SEC rulemaking.

Liquidity strategies and long-term approach to token investments.

Current investment themes across DeFi, infrastructure, AI, and consumer.

Investment logic behind L1s and L2s, and vertical integration trends.

Thoughts on corporate players launching blockchains (Stripe, Coinbase, etc.).

Investment in Blockaid and the opportunity in crypto security.

Hype vs. reality in categories like prediction markets and stablecoins.

Why DeFi remains underappreciated despite stablecoin traction.

Long-term vision for NFTs and their infrastructure layer role.

Jesse’s views on competition, Variant’s positioning, and platform differentiation.

Ongoing importance of policy support even with regulatory clarity.

Links

Jesse Walden on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jessewalden

Variant: https://variant.fund/

Brooke Pollack on X: https://x.com/bhpollack

Brooke Pollack on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brookepollack/

Hutt Capital: https://www.huttcapital.com/