Photo by Bloomberg. Art by Mike Sullivan.

Without Genesis, the Future of Barry Silbert’s DCG Hinges on a Bitcoin Bounce

Photo: Photo by Bloomberg. Art by Mike Sullivan.

Barry Silbert spent nearly a decade building Digital Currency Group, a cryptocurrency giant with subsidiaries spanning trading, media, mining, venture investing and more. After a turbulent few months, that empire is set to shrink dramatically.

The big question now is what the remaining pieces of the DCG, which landed a $10 billion valuation in a secondary share sale in 2021, will ultimately be worth. The conglomerate generated around $800 million in revenue last year, a DCG spokesperson told The Information. While lower than its $1 billion a year earlier, 2022 still saw the company’s second-highest revenue ever, the spokesperson said. But that was before Genesis’ lending business tumbled into bankruptcy last month.

Now, Genesis is looking to sell off its crypto lending and trading operations, and DCG has also been weighing a sale of its CoinDesk media arm. DCG could be left with two main money makers: Its Grayscale arm, which manages crypto investment trusts, and its Foundry crypto mining business. While DCG shuttered its HQ wealth management business last month, it hadn’t gained much traction yet. And its Luno exchange is tiny compared to rivals.

Access on the go
View stories on our mobile app and tune into our weekly podcast.
Join live video Q&A’s
Deep-dive into topics like startups and autonomous vehicles with our top reporters and other executives.
Enjoy a clutter-free experience
Read without any banner ads.
From left, a Google TPU, Broadcom CEO Hock Tan and Google Cloud chief Thomas Kurian. Photos via Getty, Google and YouTube.
Exclusive google semiconductors
To Reduce AI Costs, Google Wants to Ditch Broadcom as Its TPU Server Chip Supplier
Google executives have extensively discussed dropping Broadcom as a supplier of artificial intelligence chips as early as 2027, according to a person with direct knowledge of the effort.
Photo via Midjourney.
AI Agenda startups ai
The Rise of Startups That Help Other Startups Evaluate LLMs
All but a handful of artificial intelligence startups typically fall into one of two camps. The first group uses a single large-language model, typically OpenAI’s GPT-4, to power their applications.
Photos via Eiso Kant (left) and YouTube/VMWare Tanzu (right)
AI Agenda startups ai
How GitHub Copilot’s Co-Creator Raised $126 Million to Compete with His Former Employer
Recent interest in artificial intelligence has focused on large-language models that aim to do everything from writing Shakespearean poetry to solving math riddles.
Art by Clark Miller
Exclusive startups entertainment
MasterClass Takes a Crash Course in Frugality
MasterClass had a problem with the shoot featuring its latest star instructor, Walt Disney Co. CEO Bob Iger.
If AI researchers can meet Nat Friedman's Vesuvius Challenge, “It’ll be the first time we’ve read handwriting that hasn’t been seen in 2,000 years.” Art by Clark Miller
The AI Age culture ai
Nat Versus the Volcano: Can an AI Investor Solve an Ancient Mystery from the Ashes of Vesuvius?
Long before men’s daily thoughts about ancient Rome became a TikTok meme , former GitHub CEO Nat Friedman’s mind was regularly turning toward the Roman Empire.
Photo via Jacopo Pantaleoni.
AI Agenda ai
Nvidia Engineer’s Message to Google AI Researchers: Leave Your Company
Jacopo Pantaleoni joined Nvidia in 2001 when the company had less than 500 employees. He worked on what was then a small research project to improve Nvidia’s graphics processing units so they could better render images on computers and gaming consoles.