People enthusiastic about the concept of decentralization have mostly been pro-cryptocurrency. Initially, it was difficult to quantify the potential of the digital asset class. However, the ones who were convinced piled on significant capital. A recent Forbes report brought to light that Reddit’s Co-Founder, Alexis Ohanian, was one among them.
The executive reportedly purchased 50,000 Ethereum tokens in 2014, during its pre-sale. The average buy price was around 30 cents per token. Ohanian forked out $15,000 in total to acquire the tokens.
Elaborating on his inclination towards decentralization, Ohanian reportedly said,
“Any group of people who have in their consciousness, or in their collective history, some idea of persecution, especially by a state, makes the idea of a store of value that is not controlled by any single state very attractive. And so, in some ways, it was hardwired in me then, and made me in a way receptive to the idea of a decentralized currency.”
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Ohanian “didn’t invest” enough in Ethereum
During the interview, Ohanian mentioned his reluctance with respect to the “seizable property.” In hindsight, he is an ardent proponent of self-custody. He manages the private keys of some of his most-prized NFT and cryptocurrency investments.
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Ohanian identifies himself as a “crypto pragmatist.” Additionally, the report brought to light that he supported U.S. regulation.
In one of his first meetings with cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase, Ohanian heard about a soon-to-be-launched asset called Ether. The Reddit Co-Founder saw the Ethereum blockchain “as a tool for developers to create a wide variety of potentially unseizable assets,” including NFTs. Forbes revealed that during that summer, he invested $15,000 to buy around 50,000 Ether, now worth about $84 million.
Commenting on the size of the investment, Ohanian said,
“In hindsight, I didn’t invest nearly as much as I should have.”
Ohanian reportedly also invested in 29 startups that make use of blockchain technology. In February 2022, he raised around $500 million, to back additional firms.
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