As artificial intelligence continues to dominate venture capital flows and global headlines, some voices within the digital asset sector have begun questioning whether crypto has lost momentum to the AI boom. But according to Haseeb Qureshi, managing partner at venture firm Dragonfly, that narrative misunderstands the fundamentals of both industries.
Speaking at NEARCON 2026, Qureshi dismissed comparisons between AI’s rapid consumer adoption and crypto’s growth trajectory. He argued that the two technologies operate under very different economic models. While AI platforms have attracted hundreds of millions of users, most of them rely on free access tiers. Crypto, by contrast, has no free participation model. There is no free Bitcoin or Ethereum. Participation requires capital from the start.
Qureshi pointed out that although nearly 80 percent of Americans have experimented with AI tools, roughly 15 percent have owned cryptocurrency. In his view, that ownership rate already qualifies crypto as a mass market phenomenon. Measuring crypto’s adoption by comparing it to viral AI applications overlooks the fact that crypto functions as a financial infrastructure layer rather than a consumer productivity tool.
Instead of focusing on short term sentiment, Qureshi highlighted stablecoins as evidence of sustained utility. Stablecoin supply, he noted, has been expanding at approximately 50 percent year over year. That steady growth, independent of market volatility, reflects real demand for blockchain based payments and settlement systems.
Venture capital has undeniably rotated toward AI startups over the past year. However, Qureshi sees this shift as a natural outcome of market dynamics rather than a structural defeat for crypto. Capital tends to chase momentum, and AI’s breakout consumer moment has attracted funding accordingly. That does not mean crypto’s underlying value proposition has weakened.
Despite multiple price drawdowns, the crypto sector remains a multi trillion dollar asset class. Unlike AI giants that employ thousands of workers, crypto networks often scale globally with lean teams. Qureshi described blockchain as a high leverage technology that does not require massive corporate structures to operate at global scale.
Dragonfly recently closed a 650 million dollar fund, a move some observers considered aggressive in a cooling market. Qureshi countered that downturns are precisely when long term investors should deploy capital. Investing at peak valuations, he suggested, carries greater risk than building positions during periods of uncertainty.
On the topic of convergence between AI and crypto, Qureshi urged caution. While Dragonfly is exploring opportunities at the intersection of the two technologies, he does not believe AI will rescue or redefine crypto in the near term. Fully autonomous AI agents transacting on blockchain infrastructure remain years away from mainstream deployment.
He also rejected claims that crypto has surrendered its original ethos to traditional finance. In his view, open blockchain networks remain neutral infrastructure that anyone can use without restricting others.
For Qureshi, the current mood reflects cyclical fatigue rather than existential decline. Market corrections, funding rotations, and price volatility are recurring features of emerging technologies. Crypto’s evolution, he argued, is unfolding in cycles, not collapsing under competition.
