Unlock the Editor’s Digest free of charge
Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favorite tales on this weekly publication.
Andreessen Horowitz is closing its London workplace and pulling again from its much-touted enlargement into the UK, because the Silicon Valley investor seeks to refocus on the US cryptocurrency trade following the election of Donald Trump.
The group made a high-profile entry into the British capital in 2023, opening its first workplace outdoors the US with a give attention to the UK’s crypto trade amid a crackdown on digital belongings by American regulators.
The Monetary Occasions reported on Friday that the enterprise capital agency had signalled to native entrepreneurs and policymakers that it will cut back the money and time it meant to spend money on the nation.
Quickly after, Anthony Albanese, a managing director on the group who helps to guide its crypto investments, introduced the agency would shut its UK places of work altogether.
“We’re excited by the keenness for crypto constructing and adoption within the UK and are inspired by the latest constructive coverage bulletins and actions. Nonetheless, now we have chosen to give attention to the US given the brand new administration’s robust coverage momentum and can due to this fact be closing our UK workplace,” wrote Albanese on X.
“This doesn’t change our confidence within the UK’s rising function in crypto and blockchain. We’ll proceed to spend money on nice entrepreneurs irrespective of the place they’re on this planet, together with the UK. We additionally stay prepared to assist the UK with its ongoing crypto efforts.”
The companion initially tapped to guide the UK effort, Sriram Krishnan, stepped away from his London-based function final 12 months earlier than leaving the corporate altogether to affix the Trump administration in latest weeks.
Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz, the agency’s founders, have turn out to be supporters of Trump, whereas advising him on expertise coverage.
The change comes as Trump signed an government order on Thursday aimed toward selling cryptocurrencies within the US and dealing in direction of probably creating a nationwide digital asset stockpile.
Costs in tokens resembling bitcoin have soared since Trump’s election, below the idea that the brand new administration will advocate light-touch regulation of the crypto sector.
Andreessen Horowitz opened its London workplace with official fanfare two years in the past, with then prime minister Rishi Sunak saying he was “thrilled” on the group’s arrival, and that the transfer was a “testomony to our world-class universities and expertise and our robust aggressive enterprise setting”.
On the time, Andreessen Horowitz, which has $43bn of dedicated capital, made a lot of its push into the UK, having invested in various UK-based crypto corporations together with Arweave, Aztec and Unbelievable.
“London is a significant monetary hub, it’s a significant tech hub and admittedly it’s a really engaging place for folks to stay,” Chris Dixon, who leads Andreessen Horowitz’s crypto investments, stated to the FT in 2023.
One UK official downplayed the US investor’s lowered ambitions within the nation, saying: “They have been by no means actually right here.”
