In Episode 5 of the series, Ed Lehner discusses the "Crypto Winter" of 2018-2020. During this period, the Crypto market experienced a severe downturn in valuations. It was also a period where regulatory reforms were taking shape amidst the problems experienced with ICOs (Initial Coin Offerings). TRANSCRIPT: Hello. I'm Edward Lehner, and I'm a researcher with Captura Fund. We're in the middle of a series entitled The Short and Evolving History of Cryptocurrency Funds. And in particular, today we're to discuss the cryptocurrency winter of 2018 through, let's say, roughly the summer of 2020. This video which is the fifth in our series since we want to discuss the cryptocurrency winter. This is really a relevant topics and so much changes in the industry during this time particularly we want to discuss the growth of the industry and the way it relates to investors and how they garner exposure to this space. There is so much happening during this timeframe in 2018. This really is an interesting time since we're coming off the large bull market of 2017 but also new questions need to be answered. For example, after the bull market of 2017 many cryptocurrencies retrace by 60% and some coins retraced by 80%. How did the market respond. And another question is what happens during the cryptocurrency winter of 2018 related to regulators. There's a wealth of ICO problems in 2017 and there are and there are many other concerns for example the problem with Bitcoin Act the Quadriga Exchange and John McAfee counting many ICOs in alt coins for profit. The intersection of regulation and cryptocurrency begins in earnest really almost as soon as Bitcoin starts. But it particularly starts with a very specific focus after the bull market of 2017 and the beginning of the crypto winter of 2018. So there's much to discuss about this cryptocurrency winter this focus in particular of a cryptocurrency winter if you go in many directions. But the direction I want to take this video is in the direction of focusing on venture capital coins. This is a relatively new development and it creates a number of new opportunities but also it changes the space. So firstly related to VC coins, there's a great deal of investment during the space during this time period and particularly in this space. Yet the focus is somewhat different. It's different than let's say the successful altcoins in the successful ICOs like EOS of 2017. It's a very different focus because VC gets involved in this very nuanced way and the creation of new either scaling coins or new cryptocurrency platforms that are funded or supported at the base layer with a coin sense venture capital and Uber and the development of new off coins is such a theme during the cryptocurrency winter. We want to talk about this in a very specific way. That is today's thesis is the idea that venture capital coins are a new development. And since they happened during or they begin, the capital formation starts in the cryptocurrency winter of 2018 and everything begins to thrive. We want to discuss this in a very specific way that is I want to discuss our points by talking about one new smart contract platform in particular and that is our example of Solana. As you know Solana is a smart contract platform but it's funded very differently in the ways that Ethereum was funded. If you remember in our past video, we talked a great deal about how Ethereum was funded our thesis here is in our case in point is Solana is that venture capital takes on a new approach by starting coins directly and I want to discuss Solana in particular, although we could talk about Polygon or Polkadot or other coins that are funded in a very similar way. In other words, coins, particularly layer two coins or in this case, a layer one coin like Solana, creates a new way of funding coins, and that mirrors the ways that startups are funded our primary focal point is Solana and what Solana hopes to unleash, building on the smart contract platform idea, the one that really is unleashed by the topic. Buterin in his white paper, the theory a lot of hopes to be a layer one solution. And in particular, after the bull run of 2017, it became apparent that blockchains could not deliver fully on its promises, in particular the slow speeds of Ethereum and the slow speeds of BTC. So the secondary solution blockchains really came to the fore. And in this case, related to the Solana, they hope to become a layer one solution and a smart contract platform on which many other people will build. And since a lot of is our example and it's a great example because its price dramatically grows Salata taking on this startup mentality goes through a series of funding almost as if it were a startup Saldana is funded in a number of ways, and you can see some of the seed investing going back to 2018 and some highlight that when you look at this a lot of funding it really becomes mainstream by 2021.