From PayPal Pioneer to Digital Assets Advocate: Inside David O. Sacks' Journey to America's Top Crypto Policy Role

In late 2024, David O. Sacks received one of Silicon Valley’s most prestigious appointments when the incoming U.S. administration named him White House Director of Artificial Intelligence and Cryptocurrency. This move marked a watershed moment for the digital asset industry—for the first time, a seasoned crypto advocate would hold significant influence over America’s technology policy agenda. But this appointment was no surprise to those who have followed Sacks’ three-decade trajectory from internet payments pioneer to venture capital heavyweight to blockchain enthusiast.

Building Silicon Valley’s Future: The Entrepreneurial Foundation of David O. Sacks

Long before David O. Sacks entered policy circles, he had already established himself as one of Silicon Valley’s most prescient builders and investors. In PayPal’s formative years, Sacks served as Chief Operating Officer, placing him in the inner circle of what would later become known as the “PayPal Mafia”—that legendary cohort of former executives who went on to found or scale some of the tech industry’s most consequential companies.

His entrepreneurial ambitions didn’t stop there. Sacks founded Yammer, an enterprise software platform that eventually caught the attention of Microsoft, which acquired it for $1.2 billion. Rather than retire on his success, he co-founded Craft Ventures, establishing a venture capital practice focused on B2B software opportunities. The firm’s first fund raised $350 million, followed by a second fund of $500 million in 2019. By November 2023, Craft Ventures had expanded to $1.3 billion in total capital across multiple funds, validating its thesis about where innovation was heading.

Beyond his entrepreneurial and investment work, Sacks became a prominent voice in tech culture as co-host of “All-In Podcast,” where he regularly weighs in on economic, political, and business developments. His combination of operational experience, investment success, and media presence made him a trusted advisor to Silicon Valley’s elite—relationships that positioned him as a natural bridge between the tech community and government policymaking.

Seeing the Future: David O. Sacks’ Early Vision for Cryptocurrency and Blockchain

What distinguishes David O. Sacks from typical venture capitalists is his early and articulate commitment to cryptocurrency and blockchain technology. In a 2017 CNBC interview, Sacks provided his clearest articulation of why he believed in crypto’s potential: he saw Bitcoin as fulfilling the original vision that motivated PayPal’s founders two decades earlier.

“We wanted to create a new world currency,” Sacks explained. “But at PayPal, we tried to do it in a centralized way. Bitcoin is realizing that original vision in a decentralized way, using blockchain technology.” He characterized this moment as historic: “It feels like we are witnessing the birth of a new type of network. Some people call it the decentralized internet or the Internet of Money.”

Sacks demonstrated a sophisticated grasp of crypto’s technical foundations. He highlighted how Bitcoin combines cryptography and economic incentives—what practitioners call cryptoeconomics—to create a scarce and secure digital asset. But his insights extended beyond Bitcoin to the broader cryptocurrency ecosystem. When asked about Initial Coin Offerings and how regulators should approach them, Sacks articulated a nuanced position: the SEC should distinguish between “protocol coins” (tokens that serve genuine utility within software systems and should not be treated as securities) and “asset coins” (tokens designed primarily to function as investment vehicles and therefore rightly subject to securities regulation).

Sacks also anticipated the disruptive potential of blockchain technology for venture capital itself. When posed a question about whether tokenization would threaten traditional VC models, he responded candidly: “Yes, it will be a competitive challenge.” He argued that venture firms would need to provide real added value beyond capital to survive in a world where ICOs could bypass traditional funding gatekeepers.

Perhaps most prescient were Sacks’ identified challenges for the nascent crypto industry: scalability (how to handle more transactions), the “slideware problem” (projects that existed only as whitepapers and PowerPoint presentations with no actual product), and regulatory clarity. His enumeration of promising use cases—from value storage and payments to identity management, supply chain verification, and prediction markets—demonstrated that he was thinking systemically about crypto’s potential across diverse applications.

From Conviction to Capital: David O. Sacks’ Strategic Crypto Investments

David O. Sacks’ commitment to cryptocurrency moved beyond interviews and podcast commentary into concrete capital allocation. In 2018, Sacks joined the advisory board of 0x, a decentralized exchange protocol building infrastructure for peer-to-peer trading. That same year, through Craft Ventures, he backed Multicoin Capital, a cryptocurrency-focused venture fund that would go on to lead early funding rounds for Solana, including a $20 million investment in July 2019.

The Solana connection became particularly significant. Sacks became a substantial holder of SOL tokens and remained committed even during moments when conviction wavered. In December 2023, when rumors suggested he had divested from Solana following the FTX collapse, Sacks publicly refuted the claim: “One of the stupidest attacks against me this year was that I sold Solana tokens to retail investors. If that were true, they would have made a lot of money by now. Congratulations to everyone who holds SOL.” On his All-In Podcast, he explored Solana’s potential alongside other industry luminaries, expressing the view that Solana could eventually rank among the top-tier blockchain networks globally.

Beyond Solana, David O. Sacks’ crypto portfolio reflected a thoughtful approach to the industry’s infrastructure and applications. Through Craft Ventures, he invested in Bitwise, a leading cryptocurrency asset management firm serving institutional clients. He also backed Harbor, a blockchain-based digital securities platform designed to solve compliance challenges around tokenized assets—an opportunity he believed could introduce significant liquidity and transparency to private securities markets. (Harbor was eventually acquired by BitGo, a major digital asset custodian, in February 2020.)

The investment list extended further: Craft Ventures led the seed financing for Set Protocol in 2018 (a DeFi platform that later pivoted from its original vision), invested in Hivemapper (a decentralized mapping network) in 2022, and participated in Superplastic, a Web3-native entertainment venture, in 2023. These investments painted a picture of Sacks’ thesis—that blockchain technology would reshape infrastructure, finance, and creative industries.

Positioning America: What David O. Sacks’ Appointment Means for Cryptocurrency Policy

The appointment of David O. Sacks to oversee U.S. cryptocurrency and AI policy represents a decisive moment for the digital asset industry. His three decades of experience as an entrepreneur, venture investor, and thoughtful observer of technology’s trajectory uniquely position him to shape a regulatory framework that could allow crypto to flourish domestically while maintaining appropriate safeguards.

The policy agenda Sacks has signaled is clear: building legal clarity that gives the cryptocurrency industry the certainty it has long sought, defending online free speech against what he views as overreach by large technology platforms, and ensuring that the United States leads globally in both AI and digital assets. Given his long track record of accurately identifying emerging technologies, his strategic patience in holding convictions through market cycles, and his relationships across Silicon Valley’s most influential figures, David O. Sacks appears positioned to meaningfully shape the next chapter of America’s engagement with cryptocurrency.