Personal Philosophy and Growth

Olaf Carlson-Wee is the Founder and CEO of Polychain Capital, a $5 billion investment firm that was one of the first institutional crypto funds upon its launch in 2016. Olaf is among the crypto OGs, he was the first hire at Coinbase and led risk management before founding Polychain with initial investments from Sequoia, a16z, Union Square Ventures, and Founders Fund. He was named to both the Forbes 30 Under 30 and Fortune 40 Under 40. Our conversation explores Olaf’s vision for what is to come in the crypto ecosystem.  We cover his early discovery of cryptocurrency, his experience at Coinbase, and his founding and strategy at Polychain. We then turn to Olaf’s perspective on the present and future of incentive systems, social media, bear markets, layer 1 protocols, bridges across protocols, NFTs, DeFi, DAOs, and stablecoins.