Ex-BitMex CEO Arthur Hayes reveals his investment approach with Maelstrom Capital

Arthur Hayes, the former CEO of BitMex, and Akshat Vaidya, BitMex’s former head of corporate development, founded Maelstrom Capital.

In an interview with CoinDesk, Hayes, and Vaidya said that Maelstrom is currently targeting infrastructure companies, as that’s what makes sense in this part of the cycle.

Hayes thinks the turning point for the projects in which he’s investing now will likely come sometime around 2024 when the market starts to question whether these projects have fulfilled their promises, built their products, acquired clients, and demonstrated that their technology works.

Maelstrom is set up as Hayes’ family office using a pool of his crypto, allowing the firm to be “patient” in deploying capital. Infrastructure deals have “strong technological moats that are addressing a large market, and it’s a simple business to understand: It’s ‘P’ multiplied by market size,” explains Vaidya.

In this part of the cycle, it’s important to make money but also to have done the work during the bear market to identify which companies are genuinely valuable and which are just imitations.