When Dan Morehead—featured guest on the latest episode of Fortune’s Crypto Playbook podcast—first started digging into Bitcoin in 2013, he decided to leave behind his long career in traditional finance and throw all his chips into the world of cryptocurrencies. A former trader at Goldman Sachs and Tiger Management, Morehead felt that Bitcoin represented a financial revolution—and his bet paid off. Since Morehead first purchased Bitcoin for under $100, the price has erupted to well over $100,000—thanks in part to all of his former colleagues on Wall Street piling into the once-renegade asset.
But unlike many of those who came to the currency early, Morehead is not a “Bitcoin maxi” who shuns other coins. Rather, he has used his investment firm, Pantera Capital, to back many other crypto projects, including prominent ones like Ripple Labs and Solana. In doing so, Morehead has ridden the industry’s success to over $4 billion in assets under management.
In his interview on Crypto Playbook, Morehead made the case for investing in other blockchains and projects. “There isn’t just one internet company, right?” he said. “That’s the way I think of blockchain.”
Bitcoin vs. the rest
Among cryptocurrencies, Bitcoin still remains king, with a market cap of over $2 trillion. Ethereum, the second largest, has a market cap of just $435 billion. But investors like Morehead argue that, despite its dominance, Bitcoin’s use cases remain more limited, especially as proponents continue to push for decentralized financial applications like payments and lending. Other blockchains, such as Ethereum and Solana, offer advantages that Bitcoin does not, including speed, programmability, and lower transaction fees.
While other crypto assets may not have Bitcoin’s “escape velocity,” as Morehead puts it, they do have upside as different use cases continue to evolve. “I think it is very important for people to be invested in this space, but do it sensibly,” he said. “Don’t do more than you could afford to lose, and as long as you can hold it.”
“In 20 years, everybody will have crypto,” he added.
Despite the explosion in crypto prices, few projects have been able to achieve the mainstream success of Bitcoin, which is still mostly limited to a store of speculative value. While Pantera has invested in a variety of fields, like on-chain gaming, none have achieved the status of “killer app” or widespread adoption.
Morehead pointed to stablecoins, a type of dollar-backed cryptocurrency, as a potential breakthrough for the broader industry, especially as banks and Big Tech companies explore the field. “They’re essentially the Trojan horse of crypto,” he said. “As more and more corporations start including stablecoins, it’ll just bring more people into the blockchain ecosystem.”
Listen to the entire vodcast here.
You can also find Morehead’s interview—and future episodes of the Crypto Playbook—on Spotify, Apple, and YouTube.
