🥛 Where ‘early money’ is flowing rn 💰

GM. This is Milk Road, the crypto newsletter that feels like getting a peek at the answers before the test starts.

Here’s what we’ve got for you today:

✍️ Where ‘early money’ is flowing rn.
🎙️ The Milk Road Show: Inside the Crypto Collapse: Binance Selling, ETF Exhaustion & OG Profit Taking w/ Delphi Digital.
🍪 Bitmine just bought another $91M in ETH.

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HERE’S WHERE THE ‘EARLY MONEY’ IS FLOWING RIGHT NOW 🔍

Over $2B of VC funding flowed into crypto in Q1, and almost none of it went where Crypto Twitter might have guessed…

The biggest rounds weren't for Agential AI integrations, L1s, or memecoins.

They went to stablecoin infrastructure, custody solutions, and real-world asset tokenization:

Source: LinkedIn

The through line:

While the loudest voices in crypto still obsess over token prices and retail-focused products, VCs are quietly backing those building the crypto rails that will carry trillions.

And this capital allocation reveals where the actual value creation is happening:

Custody platforms are reaching operational maturity.
Stablecoins are becoming an enterprise payment infrastructure.
And tokenized assets are moving beyond treasury products into private credit & commodities.

Here's everything you missed so far in Q1:

1. Stablecoin infrastructure pulled in over $495M of VC funding across Rain, LMAX Group, VelaFi, and Mesh.

More stablecoin infrastructure = more stablecoin payments = more fees being paid in native tokens.

Biggest benefactors based on current stablecoin supply: Ethereum and Tron.

Source: Artemis

2. Real World Assets attracted $432M through BlackOpal, Superstate, and Gold(dot)com

We’re heavily focused on RWA growth right now - so we love to see this!

The higher the total value of RWAs, the more the global financial system moves onchain, the higher the total crypto market cap will climb…

Source: RWA

3. Trading and fintech convergence brought in $205M via Alpaca and Pomelo

The more complex trading functionality finds its way into user-friendly consumer-facing fintech platforms, the wider the reach.

And this isn’t even half of it! 👇

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HERE’S WHERE THE ‘EARLY MONEY’ IS FLOWING RIGHT NOW (P2) 🔍

Where were we?

Right, the $2B+ of VC funding that hit in Q1 and where it flowed…

4. Institutional custody saw Anchorage Digital and Talos raise a combined $107M

More institutional custody infrastructure indicates growing demand from institutions → more institutions buying/holding crypto = number go up.

(Institutional adoption may feel like an old narrative, but we still have a lot of ground to cover!) 👇

Source: LinkedIn

5. Security and compliance raised $90M through TRM Labs and Project Eleven

I know, I know – ‘security and compliance’ is boring as hell.

But institutions won’t touch crypto with a 10ft clown pole if they think they’re at risk of losing their money to a hack or getting sued into oblivion by the SEC.

6. ZBD, Jupiter, Flying Tulip, and Opinion combined for $120M

If points 1 through 5 above were too stodgy for you, this is your palate cleanser.

These companies cover:

DeFi.
Onchain gaming.
Prediction markets.

And they all got funded in Q1!

…oh, what - Q1 is too broad a time range for you? Fine.

Take this $650M fund that just closed this morning, and is looking to buy the dip:

Source: @hosseeb

One of Dragonfly’s key focuses: the tokenization of everything.

The practical takeaway from all of the above?

Follow the capital, not the noise.

The VCs writing $100M+ checks are betting on infrastructure that connects crypto to existing financial systems.

Not on speculation. Not on hype cycles.

They’re looking at the pipes, rails, and compliance layers.

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Rose: The Milk Road PRO All Access Portfolio is still outperforming the market!

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