Dragonfly invested into PepperSec, Inc., the developers of Tornado Cash, in August of 2020. We made this investment because we believe in the importance of open-source privacy-preserving technology. Prior to our investment, we obtained an outside legal opinion that confirmed that Tornado Cash as built complied with the law, under the guidance given by FinCEN in 2019. The government has now stated in open court that they are contemplating charges against Dragonfly for having invested into the Tornado Cash team in 2020. On counsel’s advice, we have refrained from public comment. But we can no longer remain silent. We believe deeply in Americans’ right to privacy, and the lack of it remains one of crypto’s largest unsolved problems. We therefore stand by our investment. We did not operate or exercise any control over Tornado Cash, we had no contact with any malicious users, we always encouraged our portfolio companies to follow the law, and we maintain that Tornado Cash itself has a lawful right to exist—a view reinforced by Van Loon v. Department of the Treasury and OFAC’s subsequent rescission of sanctions. Charging a venture firm for a portfolio company’s alleged misconduct would be unprecedented, especially under these circumstances. In 2023 we received a DOJ subpoena and have fully cooperated with the government’s investigation of Tornado Cash, confident that we have always complied with the law. The DOJ has made clear that we are not ourselves a target of their investigation. As with every investment, we provided PepperSec the same advice and support we offer all portfolio companies. We believe the government’s statement in court today was primarily to undermine a defense of Tornado Cash—to make it more difficult for the defense to call Tom to testify on the stand. After all of this time—years later—bringing charges against Dragonfly would be outrageous, contrary to the facts and the law, and would induce a chilling effect onto all investment into crypto and privacy-preserving technologies in America. We don’t believe the DOJ would actually bring such absurd and groundless charges. But if they do, we intend to vigorously defend ourselves.

Rebooting

Rebooting

Arbitrum Everywhere. Entropy Everywhere.

Rebooting

Rebooting

In November, the entire Ethereum ecosystem will convene in Buenos Aires. However, it would be a shame if we went there only to have the same self-focused discussions with the same folks we’ve seen in Berlin, Cannes, Denver, etc. Times have changed. The technology is ready, and we need to aim for mainstream adoption. We must use crypto conferences as opportunities to reach beyond our circles. We must present and explain Ethereum to the masses and help them bridge the gap to build on crypto. We at L2BEAT Governance Team (@l2beatgov) were brainstorming recently on how we can help bridge that gap. We have some ideas. Stay tuned and feel free to reach out to me if you want to help. We're cooking! Come cook with us!

Esto fue SEED Org. All Hands 🙌 Un repaso por el camino que nos ha traido hasta acá y hermosas vistas a todo lo que se viene en el horizonte, especialmente en esta previa road to @EFDevcon 🚀 Felicidades team @SEEDNodes @SEEDGov 👏 🫡 Seguimos construyendo para ud!

@arbitrum D.A.O. Grants is currently 120 days in. Quick pulse-check • 465 proposals received since launch (avg. 4 per day) • 60 proposals approved • $1.6m allocated • 23.7% of the $6.75m budget allocated Where’s the budget going so far? Gaming = 43.8% Education & Community = 37% Dev Tooling = 15.9% New Protocols = 4.4% Orbit = 1.1% The program is pacing itself, filtering harder, and funding projects that tighten Arbitrum’s feedback loop between builders and users. Plenty of dry powder left in the program; the question is whether teams are building projects that will help Arbitrum win.

closing lev positions, prepping for smol holiday, see u in a week