Temasek has said it doesn’t directly invest in cryptocurrencies and prefers to back service providers in the space instead. In February, the state fund joined a US$200 million funding for crypto lender Amber Group at a US$3 billion valuation. Animoca and Temasek spokespeople declined to comment.
Animoca has evolved from a small mobile game publisher to Asia’s biggest blockchain investor by assembling a portfolio of more than 340 finance, gaming, and social media companies in less than five years. Co-founder Yat Siu envisions challenging the dominance of Big Tech firms like Meta Platforms Inc. and Microsoft Corp. by building virtual worlds on the blockchain, creating the so-called Web3 in the process.
The crypto winter, which has wiped out US$2 trillion in digital asset value since November, has left most investors reeling. Funding for digital currency-related startups fell 26% last quarter from the one before, and it’s on pace to fall further still in the current period, according to PitchBook data.
Animoca, for its part, is seeking to take advantage of the crypto downturn to buy up stakes in industry players and digital tokens, Siu told Bloomberg News in a recent interview. The firm wants to go public, perhaps in the next two to three years. That will depend on the market’s acceptance of its core business of selling crypto tokens and taking a cut from secondary transactions, Siu said.
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Animoca’s capital raise hasn’t been entirely smooth. Buyout giant KKR & Co. was among prospective backers who decided to withdraw from its funding round after the market rout, Bloomberg News reported in July.
