By Peter Johnson and Sai Nimmagadda

Throughout history, there have been examples of commodity markets that have experienced increased volatility due to the impact of exogenous events. While factors outside of markets helped reduce these risks for those producing and consuming the commodity (i.e., globalization resulting in more efficient shipping/transport and networking), derivatives act as a tool for broader price discovery. Furthermore, derivatives can be used to better manage businesses that are reliant on the commodity. There is a similar opportunity around Ethereum blockspace. With the development of blockspace derivatives stakeholders can provide better user experiences, have more tools to manage their businesses, and increase efficiency for price discovery of blockspace. Below we provide an overview of the current state of Ethereum blockspace, historical analogies to traditional markets, and seek to build upon others’ research demonstrating the key considerations for developing a market for blockspace derivatives.

While Ethereum’s original core vision has endured, its wider purpose has evolved significantly. With recent technological advances (i.e., rollups) and a modularized future likely being a dominant reality, it is likely that Ethereum is becoming THE marketplace for secure blockspace.

“Should I Still Give a Damn about Crypto?” – That was the title\* of a panel I recently spoke on and is the question some investors are asking after a brutal 2022 for crypto/web3. These investors may have been surprised by my main message during this panel, which was:   

We are excited to deepen our partnership with CEO / Co-founder Esteban Castano, CTO / Co-founder Rahul Raina, and the rest of the talented team at TRM Labs through our participation in the company’s recent $70mm Series B expansion. At Brevan Howard Digital, our team is deeply familiar with TRM Labs and its team from using their product and evaluating competitive offerings at Brevan Howard Digital and previous firms. We are a satisfied customer of TRM Labs and have experienced the breadth and depth of use cases covered by TRM Labs significantly expand over time.

By: Peter Johnson

We’re thrilled to co-lead Horizon Blockchain Games’ (“Horizon”) $40 million Series A round with Morgan Creek Digital and continue the longstanding relationship Colleen Sullivan has with Peter Kieltyka, Michael Sanders, Deborah Marfurt, and the broader Horizon team. Horizon, founded in 2017, is a web3 technology / infrastructure and game company based in Toronto. Horizon unlocks the utility of blockchain networks to drive mainstream adoption of web3 through its fun, skill-based digital trading card game, Skyweaver, and its Sequence web3 developer platform. Skyweaver has brought hundreds of thousands of players to web3\[1] through its delightful gameplay, beautiful art, and engaging stories. The Sequence web3 developer platform, which brought Skyweaver to life, is quickly becoming the go-to platform for any company or project building a web3 game, metaverse, marketplace, or consumer-facing web3 product. 

We are excited to lead Messari’s $35mm Series B round and deepen our partnership with Ryan Selkis and the Messari team. Over the last 4+ years, Messari has become a trusted source for crypto data, research, and asset intelligence, and we look forward to leveraging our team’s connectivity across the crypto and TradFi ecosystems to help further accelerate the company’s impressive growth. Brevan Howard Digital is already an active user of Messari and has experienced first-hand the extensive value of their platform.