Paradigm Raises $1.2B for Fourth Fund in AI Push

Paradigm has raised $1.2 billion for its fourth fund, which will expand the crypto venture capital firm’s investments into artificial intelligence and related technologies.

The company said on Wednesday that its latest fund will invest “first in crypto, and now across AI, robotics and other frontiers.”

“We continue investing in crypto and the reinvention of markets and the financial system,” Paradigm added, highlighting its investments in the crypto perpetuals exchange Hyperliquid and the prediction markets platform Kalshi.

Paradigm launched in 2018 and has raised more than $4 billion for three funds focused on crypto. Its interest in AI follows a trend of originally crypto-focused companies that have been lured to the lucrative and fast-growing sector.

Source: Matt Huang

The Wall Street Journal reported in February that Paradigm was seeking to raise $1.5 billion for a new fund that would invest in AI and robotics.

The company’s management reportedly decided to broaden its investments as it didn’t want to be restricted and miss out on attractive deals. There was also a noted overlap between crypto and AI, such as with AI agents.

Crypto exchanges such as Crypto.com and Coinbase have made big bets on AI agents, offering the technology to their users and updating their platforms to cater to the bots.

Crypto funding sinks as AI funding peaks

Other crypto venture companies have moved beyond crypto, including Framework Ventures, which raised $400 million for its fourth fund last month for investments in crypto as well as AI, robotics and energy.

In May, crypto venture firm Haun Ventures raised $1 billion to back crypto startups and expanded into AI for the first time.

Global venture funding hit a record $510 billion in the first half of 2026, a new record for half-year investments that surpassed the $440 billion invested across all of last year, Crunchbase reported on July 2.

Related: Morpho’s $175M raise shows where crypto VC money is flowing

AI companies made up the majority of the investment, with OpenAI and Anthropic accounting for more than 40% of funding in the first half of the year.

Meanwhile, crypto captured only a portion of all venture flows, with funding into crypto in the first half hitting $10.8 billion, according to Cryptorank.

Paradigm highlighted that some of its non-crypto investments included the autonomous drone delivery service Zipline, the robotic metal fabrication platform SendCutSend and the AI company Nous Research, which created the open-source AI model Hermes Agent.

It added that it would “continue to research and build where it accelerates” the crypto industry, and noted the blockchain tools Foundry and Reth and the AI projects EVMbench and Centaur.

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