Crypto VCs split on the election

Blockchain-loving venture capitalists are tending toward former President Trump in the 2024 election, but it's not unanimous.

Why it matters: Where business leader endorsements go, financial support for campaigns is likely to flow.

The latest: On Tuesday, the founders of Andreessen Horowitz (aka, a16z) posted a YouTube video about their decision to back the Republican candidate.

• Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz give several reasons, but their frustrations over crypto policy seem to be the one they take the most personally.

What they're saying: "I've been in absolute shock that this has ever happened," Andreessen said. "This has been a brutal assault on a nascent industry that I've never experienced before ... it's been impossible to make progress in this with the White House."

• Horowitz described the Biden administration's approach to cryptocurrency as "talk to the hand," contrasting that with former presidents Clinton and Obama, both Democrats they found more open to discussion with business leaders.

The fine print: In the talk, Andreessen is focused on the events of the story, while Horowitz seems more distraught by the consequences their endorsement is going to have for them and their staff.

• Horowitz shifts subjects abruptly, saying, "This is probably the most emotional topic, so let's move on to artificial intelligence."

The other side: There are major tech leaders with crypto investments who support President Biden.

• LinkedIn co-founder, Greylock partner (occasional crypto investor and filmmaker) Reid Hoffman has stood with Biden, including penning an op-ed saying that business leaders should back someone who has been a consistent, steady hand in the White House.
• Following the president's debate performance, which shocked many of his supporters, Hoffman doubled down. He said on CNBC that business leaders should stick with Biden.

Mark Cuban is another crypto investor who has also stuck with the Democrats. He says the lurch toward Trumpism is not, in his view, really about a better regulatory climate.

• "It's a bitcoin play," Cuban wrote on X.
• If elected, he predicted a Trump trifecta of lower taxes, higher tariffs and geopolitical uncertainty.

• "You can't align the stars any better for a BTC price acceleration."

Between the lines: Ethereum's founder and an investor himself, Vitalik Buterin, criticized the recent endorsement trend without backing any candidates.

• In a blog post yesterday, he urged people not to put the industry before the ideas behind the technology in the voting booth.
• "What originally created crypto was the cypherpunk movement, a much broader techno-libertarian ethos which argued for free and open technology as a way of protecting and enhancing individual freedoms generally," he writes.

The bottom line: There are no monoliths in this election.