# Christopher Burniske

> Christopher Burniske is a seed investor at Placeholder backing Blockchain. See 16 investments, check sizes, portfolio. Updated Aug 2026.

- Type: Angel Investor
- Fund: [Placeholder](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/placeholder-55ca)
- Location: New York, United States
- Total investments: 16
- Last investment: Apr 2026
- Lead investor: 50%
- Last updated: Aug 2026
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/burniske/

Christopher Burniske is a seed investor at Placeholder in New York focused on Blockchain and Information Technology. Chris Burniske joined ARK as a Next Generation Internet analyst in August 2014, covering big data, cloud computing, cybersecurity, and cryptocurrency. After ARK became the first public fund manager to invest in bitcoin, Chris transitioned to the role of Blockchain Products Lead. He now collaborates with the ARK business development team andperforms deep dive research on the cryptocurrency and blockchain space.Chris regularly speaks at conferences and has contributed to CNBC, Bloomberg, WSJ, USA Today, the Guardian and other media outlets on topics relating to Bitcoin, Ethereum and more. He also chairs the Blockchain Assets Working Group for the Wall Street Blockchain Alliance. Chris graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a Bachelor of Science in Earth Systems from Stanford.

## Investment focus

### Industry

| Industry | Investments | Share |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Blockchain | 7 | 44% |
| Information Technology | 3 | 19% |
| Apps | 2 | 13% |
| Software | 2 | 13% |
| Gaming | 1 | 6% |

18 industries tracked in total.

### Stage

| Stage | Investments | Share |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Seed | 5 | 31% |
| Series A | 5 | 31% |
| Series B | 1 | 6% |
| Funding Round | 1 | 6% |
| Initial Coin Offering | 1 | 6% |

6 stages tracked in total.

### Country

| Country | Investments | Share |
| --- | --- | --- |
| United States | 3 | 19% |
| Singapore | 1 | 6% |
| Philippines | 1 | 6% |
| Liechtenstein | 1 | 6% |
| Cayman Islands | 1 | 6% |

6 countries tracked in total.

## Investments

| Company | Description | Amount | Stage | Date | Website |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Squads | Squads is a developer of a decentralized program that enables the establishment of better and easier decentralized autonomous groups. The company's application combines all of the key components of a decentralized autonomous organization, such as deployment, treasury, vault management, on-chain voting, and chat, into a single portal with aneasy-to-use interface, allowing users to streamline daily operations using a decentralized autonomous organization structure. | $18M | Venture - Series Unknown | Apr 29, 2026 |  |
| Celestia | Celestia is a pluggable consensus and data availability layer, to enable anyone to quickly deploy a decentralised blockchain without the overhead of bootstrapping a new consensus network. | $100M | Series B | Sep 23, 2024 |  |
| Squads | Squads is a developer of a decentralized program that enables the establishment of better and easier decentralized autonomous groups. The company's application combines all of the key components of a decentralized autonomous organization, such as deployment, treasury, vault management, on-chain voting, and chat, into a single portal with aneasy-to-use interface, allowing users to streamline daily operations using a decentralized autonomous organization structure. | $10M | Series A | Jun 10, 2024 |  |
| Eclipse | Eclipse customizable blockchain platform powered by Solana enables developers to build apps for Web2. | $50M | Series A | Mar 11, 2024 |  |
| Saga.xyz | Saga.xyz gives visionaries the high-end tools and support they need to turn their blockchain dreams into reality. | $5M | Seed | Nov 20, 2023 |  |
| Squads | Squads is a developer of a decentralized program that enables the establishment of better and easier decentralized autonomous groups. The company's application combines all of the key components of a decentralized autonomous organization, such as deployment, treasury, vault management, on-chain voting, and chat, into a single portal with aneasy-to-use interface, allowing users to streamline daily operations using a decentralized autonomous organization structure. | $5.7M | Venture - Series Unknown | Oct 16, 2023 |  |
| Drip Labs | DRiP creates creator-centric Web3 content distribution network and offers free digital gifts from well-known producers.block | $3M | Seed | Aug 27, 2023 |  |
| Infinity Exchange | Infinity Exchange is a new platform that provides institutional-grade capital efficiency in decentralized finance. |  | Seed | Apr 23, 2023 |  |
| Infinity Exchange | Infinity Exchange is a new platform that provides institutional-grade capital efficiency in decentralized finance. |  | Seed | Feb 15, 2023 |  |
| Monad | MONAD is a proof-of-stake (PoS) blockchain and decentralized computation platform that combines the best of performance and portability. | $19M | Seed | Feb 14, 2023 |  |

10 of 16 investments shown.

## Co-investors
- [Polychain](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/polychain-capital) — VC Fund, 5 deals together
- [Jump Crypto](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/jump-crypto) — VC Fund, 4 deals together
- [Maven 11 Capital](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/maven-11-capital) — VC Fund, 4 deals together
- [Bain Capital Crypto](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/bain-capital-crypto) — VC Fund, 3 deals together
- [Coinbase Ventures](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/coinbase-ventures) — VC Fund, 3 deals together
- [Collab+Currency](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/collab-currency) — VC Fund, 3 deals together

## About Placeholder

VC Fund · New York, United States

Placeholder is a venture capital firm that invests in decentralized networks and web services.

4 contacts available at Placeholder.

| Name | Title | Profile |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Alex Evans | Researcher | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/alex-evans |
| Christopher Burniske | Partner & Founder | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/christopher-burniske |
| Joel Monegro | Co-Founder & Managing Partner | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/joel-monegro-3634 |
| Joel Monegro | Co-Founder & Managing Partner | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/joel-monegro |

## Similar investors

### Similar stage
- [Antler](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/antler-be9c) — VC Fund
- [Alumni Ventures](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/alumni-ventures-group) — VC Fund
- [Right Side Capital Management](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/right-side-capital-management) — VC Fund

## FAQ

### What does Christopher Burniske invest in?

Christopher Burniske invests primarily in Blockchain, Information Technology and Apps startups, most often at Seed and Series A stage. Most of the 16 investments tracked by Shizune back companies in United States. The Investment Focus section breaks down every industry, stage and country in the portfolio.

### When did Christopher Burniske last invest?

The most recent investment recorded for Christopher Burniske closed in Apr 2026. Shizune tracks 16 investments in total for this profile, including round sizes, stages and portfolio companies, all sourced from confirmed public funding rounds and refreshed monthly.

### Is Shizune's investor data accurate?

Yes — every stat on this profile is calculated from confirmed public funding rounds monitored across hundreds of sources since 2020. This profile was last refreshed in Aug 2026 and is updated monthly. Spotted something off? Use the “Suggest an edit” link near the top of the page.

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