VVV Live Thesis
$23.90
LiveDay 0: Aug 29, 2026 · day 51 · market data 2 sec ago

Is the VVV thesis working?

Neutral2 of 4 measurable pillars strengthening

Only 15.28M VVV is actually for sale. This bet says it gets valued like the AI companies it competes with.

VVV price
$23.90
+7.4% 24h
Free float
15.28M VVV
+12.4% since Day 0
Free-float cap
$365.2M
+61.8% since Day 0
Burned since Day 0
70.1K VVV
$2M at spot
To TAO parity
8.5x
$3.09B TAO cap
Venice ARR
$100M+
Verified Aug 29, 2026

Price targets

Called Aug 29 at $16.60. Now $23.90.

Base case
$1004.2x
$1.53B free-float cap

The first big step up.

11%
Bull case
$50020.9x
$7.64B free-float cap

Valued like Stripe valued OpenRouter.

2%
Extreme bull
$1,00041.8x
$15.28B free-float cap

Worth about what Baseten is worth.

1%
Why now

This is the whole bet, and it just hit the front page

Sep 8, 2026. A mathematician ran a year of unpublished work through OpenAI's Codex, asked if they trained on it, and got no answer.

NYU professor Tristan Buckmaster and Levent Alpöge published three proofs on Navier-Stokes, one of the biggest open problems in maths. Word of their progress reached OpenAI. Days later an OpenAI team took the same narrow approach and published a full proof first.

He ran the whole project through Codex. He asked about it:

“I asked whether the model had been trained on, or had access to, our sessions in Codex, into which we had been putting all our drafts for the whole of this project. I was told the model did not look up user data. I asked again, about training, and I did not get an answer.”
Tristan Buckmaster, NYU, September 8, 2026. Full statement

He paid out of his own research funds. Personal account, and OpenAI publishes what that means:

“When you use our services for individuals such as ChatGPT and Codex, we may use your content to train our models.”
“Codex has separate controls for allowing training on full environments... Note that adjusting your settings in the ChatGPT interface or privacy portal will not affect these full-environment Codex settings.”
OpenAI Help Center, updated August 2026. Read it. Training is on by default for personal accounts. The obvious opt-out misses Codex full environments.

And OpenAI, in its own post announcing the proof:

“While unlikely, we cannot rule out that de-identified data derived from their usage of our products helped improve our models.”
OpenAI. It says it never accessed his work and that the proofs differ.

Training is on by default. The opt-out has holes. A researcher ran a year of unpublished work through it, asked twice, and got no answer. OpenAI leaves the door open itself. That alone changes how people buy AI.

Venice deletes prompts by default. Paid tiers run them in sealed hardware, hidden even from Venice. Every subscription sold on that basis buys VVV on the open market and burns it. That is the link to the numbers below.

What Venice offers

AnonymousAll users
Venice proxies the request to a frontier provider. Identity is obscured, but Venice tells you to assume the provider stores the content.
PrivateDefault
Inference runs on Venice-controlled GPUs or zero-retention partner infrastructure. No prompt or response is stored. Enforced by contract.
TEEPro
Hardware-isolated enclave run by NEAR AI Cloud and Phala Network. The GPU operator cannot read prompts. Verified by remote attestation.
E2EEPro
Encrypted on device, decrypted only inside a verified enclave. Venice cannot read it either.
venice.ai/privacy
Press

Sources and coverage

Primary sources, with both sides.

  1. CategorySep 8, 2026· TechCrunch
    OpenAI fought dirty on career-making math problem, says NYU mathematician

    Tristan Buckmaster says a rival effort built on his work after it reached OpenAI. He had used Codex heavily while assembling the project.

  2. CategorySep 8, 2026· VentureBeat
    OpenAI solves longstanding math problem, but can't rule out benefitting from a researcher's private Codex data

    OpenAI denies accessing the work and says the proofs differ, while stating it cannot rule out that de-identified usage data improved its models.

  3. CategorySep 8, 2026· OpenAI
    A solution to the Navier-Stokes existence and smoothness problem

    The company's own account, published the same day. Worth reading next to the statement it responds to.

  4. CategorySep 8, 2026· Tristan Buckmaster, NYU
    Statement accompanying three proofs

    The original document. Worth reading before the coverage above.

  5. CategoryAug 18, 2026· OpenAI Help Center
    How your data is used to improve model performance

    OpenAI's own policy. Personal ChatGPT and Codex accounts are trained on unless you opt out, and the usual opt-out does not cover Codex full environments.

  6. VeniceJul 1, 2026· TechCrunch
    Venice AI becomes a unicorn with $65M Series A as its privacy-first platform takes off

    Profitable, with annualized run-rate revenue over $70M at the time, per CEO Erik Voorhees.

  7. VeniceApr 15, 2026· Venice
    Introducing Programmatic VVV Buy & Burns

    Every new subscription automatically buys VVV on the open market and burns it. This is what the whole bet rests on.

  8. ComparatorAug 17, 2026· Wall Street Journal, via Sacra
    Stripe acquires OpenRouter for more than $7B

    The comparator behind the $500 VVV level on this page.

  9. ComparatorJul 16, 2026· CNBC
    Fireworks AI raises $1.5B Series D at a $17.5B valuation

    The top comparator on the chart, and the ceiling the $1,000 level still sits below.

Free-float valuation vs comparators

Logarithmic. VVV plotted as free-float cap, comparators as full market cap.

The VVV line applies today's free float of 15.28M VVV to each day's close. It was 13.60M at Day 0, so this shifts the line by under 3 percent.

Valuation scoreboard

How far is VVV from each level?

Implied VVV is the price if VVV were valued like that company today.

BenchmarkValuationImplied VVVMultipleGap closed
VVV todayFree-float cap$365.2M$23.901.0x—
$100 VVV
$1.53B$1004.2x
11%
TAO market cap
Live market capitalization · CoinGecko
$3.09B$2028.5x
5%
$250 VVV
$3.82B$25010.5x
4%
NEAR market cap
Live market capitalization · CoinGecko
$6.61B$43318.1x
2%
OpenRouter
Acquisition value · Aug 17, 2026 · Wall Street Journal, via Sacra
$7.00B$45819.2x
2%
$500 VVV
$7.64B$50020.9x
2%
Baseten
Private financing valuation (reported, dual-tier $11B / $13B) · Jun 22, 2026 · TechCrunch / The Information, via Forbes
$13.00B$85135.6x
1%
$1,000 VVV
$15.28B$1,00041.8x
1%
Fireworks AI
Post-money valuation · Jul 15, 2026 · Businesswire (company announcement), via CNBC
$17.50B$1,14547.9x
1%
ZEC market cap
Live market capitalization · CoinGecko
$19.74B$1,29254.1x
1%
The case

Where these targets come from

Each target is a company-sized valuation, turned back into a VVV price.

Venice is profitable and growing fast, and barely any of its token is for sale. Revenue buys VVV and burns it. Staking locks more away. New supply is being cut. VVV should end up valued closer to the AI companies it competes with.

It runs backwards too. Growth stalls, buybacks slow, people unstake, and this page will say so.

ScenarioVVVFree-float capFrom here
Day 0
Aug 29, 2026
$16.60$225.76Mbaseline
Today
day 51
$23.90$365.22M1.4x
Base case
The first big step up.
$100$1.53B4.2x
Bull case
Valued like Stripe valued OpenRouter.
$500$7.64B20.9x
Extreme bull
Worth about what Baseten is worth.
$1,000$15.28B41.8x
$100

A $1.4B valuation. Venice only has to keep growing from a business already past $100M a year while supply stays tight.

$500

A $6.95B valuation. Roughly the $7B Stripe paid for OpenRouter.

$1,000

A $13.9B valuation. About what Baseten is worth, under the $17.5B Fireworks raised at.

How it works

What has to happen, step by step

Every step is something Venice already built.

  1. 1
    Revenue grows

    Profitable at $70M+ a year by the July 2026 Series A. Past $100M by Day 0.

    TechCrunch, July 1, 2026
  2. 2
    Revenue buys VVV

    Every new subscription buys VVV on the open market and burns it. $2 Pro, $5 Pro+, $10 Max, automatic. Venice buys back on top of that.

    Venice, Programmatic VVV Buy & Burns
  3. 3
    Burned VVV never comes back

    Burned VVV is gone for good. Over 33.8M so far, about 42% of the original supply.

    Venice token dashboard
  4. 4
    Usage locks more VVV away

    Lock staked VVV to create DIEM. Each DIEM pays $1 a day of Venice credit for as long as you hold it. Buying compute locks VVV away.

    Venice, VVV & DIEM
  5. 5
    The sellable float stays small

    About 13.9M VVV is actually buyable, out of 48M in circulation.

    Live on this page

The rest of the page answers one question: is it happening?

Pillar grades

Five things that have to be true

Each one graded on its own numbers. The headline is a count of how many are improving.

Neutral

Business growth

Pending data
ARR ran $70M+ to $100M+ in under two months

Venice reports these when it feels like it, not on a live feed, so this holds neutral until a number newer than Day 0 arrives. The run into Day 0 was steep. Profitable at $70M+ a year at the July raise, $100M+ by launch. Nothing is guessed for the gaps.

Venice ARR
$100M+ · 2026-08
Registered users
3.5M · 2026-08
API calls per day
2M / day · 2026-08
Tokens processed per month
1.3T / month · 2026-08

Structural buy pressure

Weakening
Burn pace running -23% vs Day 0

Read straight off the blockchain. Venice sends the VVV it buys back to a dead address, so that balance only ever goes up. The pace is what has burned since Day 0, scaled to 30 days, against the 53.7K VVV burned in the 30 days before launch.

Burned since Day 0
70.1K VVV
Implied 30D pace
41.3K VVV
Day 0 30D burn
53.7K VVV
Total burned
33.91M VVV

Supply compression

Weakening
Free float up 12.4% since Day 0

This bet needs the amount of VVV people can actually sell to shrink. Free float is the circulating supply Venice reports, minus every VVV locked up in staking.

Free float
15.28M VVV (+12.4%)
Staked + DIEM-locked
-2.3% vs Day 0
DIEM supply
36.7K DIEM
Total burned
33.91M VVV

Relative valuation

Strengthening
8.5x to TAO parity

How far VVV sits below what the market pays for the others. The gap shrinking is the bet working. It compares valuations only, not what owning each one gets you.

Multiple to TAO
8.5x
Multiple to ZEC
54.1x
Multiple to NEAR
18.1x
Day 0 multiple to TAO
10.0x

Market performance

Strengthening
VVV +44% since Day 0

Price change since Day 0 against the tokens you can actually trade. The figures below are 24-hour moves. The Since Day 0 chart shows the full picture.

VVV since Day 0
+44.0%
TAO 24h
+1.3%
ZEC 24h
+2.7%
NEAR 24h
+1.3%

How the grade is built

Every rule was set at launch and compares against Day 0. Business growth sits out until Venice publishes something new, so the headline rests on 4 of the five.

Thesis scorecard

Day 0 versus now, metric by metric

Every rule was written at launch, before the data moved.

MetricDay 0CurrentChangeSignal
VVV price
Positive if higher
$16.60$23.90+44.0%Positive
Free-float cap
Positive if higher
$225.8M$365.2M+61.8%Positive
Free circulating VVV
Positive if lower
13.60M15.28M+12.4%Negative
Staked + DIEM-locked VVV
Positive if higher
34.32M33.54M-2.3%Negative
Total VVV burned
Positive if higher
33.84M33.91M+0.21%Positive
30D buy + burn (VVV)
Positive if higher
53.7K41.3K-23%Negative
30D buy + burn (USD)
Positive if higher. Valued at the current VVV price.
$672.6K$986.1K+47%Neutral
DIEM supply
Positive if higher. Baseline starts today.
Not recorded36.7K DIEM—Neutral
Multiple to TAO parity
Positive if lower. The gap closing is the thesis working.
10.0x8.5x-16%Positive
Multiple to ZEC parity
Positive if lower. The gap closing is the thesis working.
63.0x54.1x-14%Positive
Multiple to NEAR parity
Positive if lower. The gap closing is the thesis working.
10.8x18.1x+68%Negative
Venice ARR
Positive if higher· Last verified Aug 29, 2026
$100M+$100M+No new disclosureNeutral
Custody and flows

Where the VVV actually sits

Balances read from Base for every address Arkham names. Flows read from the token's own transfer log.

Oct 19, 2026
In exchange custody
6.6M VVV
$158.7M

-163K VVV over 28 days on record.

Bought out of pools
-35K VVV
$-1.2M

Net VVV taken out of the DEX pools. Negative means holders sold into them.

Net into staking
-512K VVV
$-14.2M

VVV locked in the staking vault. It leaves the float and earns inference credit.

HolderTypeVVVValueAddresses
CoinbaseExchange3M$64.5M3
SablierVesting lockup2M$37.9M2
BybitExchange1M$31.4M1
KrakenExchange913K$22.1M4
OKXExchange697K$16.9M2
AerodromeDEX pool697K$16.9M3
RobinhoodExchange347K$8.4M1
Gate.ioExchange329K$8.0M2
RevolutExchange209K$5.1M1
MEXCExchange90K$2.2M1
B2C2Market maker72K$1.7M1
Near IntentsBridge64K$1.6M1
KuCoinExchange7K$160K1
MoonwellLending market4K$102K1

How to read it. Every balance here was read from the VVV contract on Base at 2026-10-19 06:03 UTC, across 36 labelled addresses. Entity names come from Arkham’s public page for VVV, snapshotted Sep 22, 2026. The numbers are verified on chain every run, so a wrong label shows up as an entity holding nothing. Venice AI's own contracts and treasury hold 65.5M VVV and are listed separately from the table above.

What this cannot see. A fund buying on Coinbase and leaving the VVV in Prime custody never touches the chain, and an OTC block traded off exchange does not either. Coinbase also issues a fresh deposit address per customer, so its labelled wallets understate what passes through it. These figures are a floor, never a ceiling. No wallet is named as a buyer here: an unlabelled address gaining VVV in a day is usually an exchange sweeping its own deposit addresses, not somebody building a position.

Daily record

One row per day since Day 0

Saved daily to a public repo. Old rows stay as written.

43 days on record
DateVVV closeFree floatStaked + lockedBurned
Oct 19, 2026
$24.15
15.28M
+50.1K
33.55M
-36.0K
33.91M
+924.7
Oct 18, 2026
$22.56
15.23M
+62.3K
33.58M
+1.1K
33.91M
+868.1
Oct 17, 2026
$23.04
15.17M
-72.0K
33.58M
+92.0K
33.91M
+908.9
Oct 16, 2026
$24.42
15.24M
-20.7K
33.49M
+30.6K
33.91M
+949.3
Oct 15, 2026
$22.05
15.26M
-6.0K
33.46M
+19.9K
33.91M
+889.8
Oct 14, 2026
$23.40
15.26M
+12.7K
33.44M
+31.3K
33.91M
+863.2
Oct 13, 2026
$22.91
15.25M
-63.2K
33.41M
+79.9K
33.91M
+949.0
Oct 12, 2026
$24.86
15.32M
-1.8K
33.33M
+8.5K
33.91M
+837.6
Oct 11, 2026
$22.33
15.32M
+14.8K
33.32M
+3.0K
33.91M
+848.3
Oct 10, 2026
$22.70
15.30M
-17.8K
33.32M
+23.0K
33.91M
+917.0
Oct 9, 2026
$22.85
15.32M
-92.4K
33.29M
+107.0K
33.91M
+866.9
Oct 8, 2026
$24.78
15.41M
+12.4K
33.19M
+406.6
33.90M
+16.9K
Oct 7, 2026
$27.00
15.40M
+7.6K
33.19M
+9.5K
33.89M
+668.0
Oct 6, 2026
$27.76
15.39M
-40.1K
33.18M
-35.1K
33.89M
+714.4
Oct 5, 2026
$29.38
15.43M
-1.6K
33.21M
+7.5K
33.89M
+649.9
Oct 4, 2026
$27.86
15.43M
+130.7K
33.21M
-102.3K
33.89M
+660.3
Oct 3, 2026
$27.43
15.30M
+26.7K
33.31M
-1.7K
33.89M
+665.4
Oct 2, 2026
$27.91
15.28M
-73.6K
33.31M
+87.8K
33.88M
+744.8
Oct 1, 2026
$28.06
15.35M
+8.0K
33.22M
-533.3
33.88M
+706.6
Sep 30, 2026
$26.73
15.34M
-17.8K
33.22M
+23.6K
33.88M
+690.4
Sep 29, 2026
$27.26
15.36M
+149.9K
33.20M
-73.8K
33.88M
+660.4
Sep 28, 2026
$28.02
15.21M
+48.7K
33.27M
-30.1K
33.88M
+569.4
Sep 27, 2026
$29.44
15.16M
+24.2K
33.30M
-18.2K
33.88M
+545.2
Sep 26, 2026
$30.28
15.14M
+55.9K
33.32M
-38.0K
33.88M
+554.7
Sep 25, 2026
$30.99
15.08M
+28.0K
33.36M
-17.9K
33.88M
+511.4
Sep 24, 2026
$30.65
15.05M
+140.5K
33.38M
-131.5K
33.88M
+516.8
Sep 23, 2026
$32.55
14.91M
+163.6K
33.51M
-147.0K
33.88M
+467.5
Sep 22, 2026
$30.59
14.75M
+112.0K
33.65M
-97.9K
33.88M
+501.0
Sep 21, 2026
$32.73
14.64M
+222.1K
33.75M
-191.2K
33.88M
+518.3
Sep 20, 2026
$26.74
14.42M
+18.2K
33.94M
-7.8K
33.88M
+521.2
Sep 19, 2026
$27.47
14.40M
+45.1K
33.95M
-27.5K
33.88M
+571.9
Sep 18, 2026
$24.34
14.35M
+126.2K
33.98M
-105.6K
33.88M
+581.8
Sep 17, 2026
$25.11
14.23M
+27.1K
34.09M
+29.0K
33.88M
+647.1
Sep 16, 2026
$21.61
14.20M
+28.1K
34.06M
-15.5K
33.88M
+685.6
Sep 15, 2026
$22.05
14.17M
-31.1K
34.07M
+46.3K
33.87M
+626.6
Sep 14, 2026
$22.59
14.20M
+14.0K
34.03M
-4.9K
33.87M
+602.2
Sep 13, 2026
$23.94
14.19M
+39.3K
34.03M
-28.5K
33.87M
+591.3
Sep 12, 2026
$23.68
14.15M
+29.2K
34.06M
-19.5K
33.87M
+601.9
Sep 11, 2026
$24.24
14.12M
+62.4K
34.08M
-49.0K
33.87M
+596.8
Sep 10, 2026
$24.31
14.06M
+152.3K
34.13M
-120.5K
33.87M
+712.6
Sep 9, 2026
$25.91
13.90M
+837.7
34.25M
-731.0
33.87M
+10.0
Sep 8, 2026
$25.46
13.90M
+303.4K
34.25M
-73.7K
33.87M
+26.2K
Aug 29, 2026Day 0
Base block 50,586,127
$16.57
13.60M
34.32M
33.84M
Risks

What would prove this wrong

Written at launch. Live where there is a source for it.

  • Venice revenue growth slows down, or they just stop publishing the numbersWatch
  • Venice buys back less VVV than the 53.7K per 30 days it was doing at Day 0Tripped
  • People unstake, and more VVV becomes available to sellTripped
  • Staking and DIEM locking drop, putting supply back on the marketWatch
  • New VVV paid out to stakers outpaces what gets burnedWatch
  • VVV keeps losing to TAO, ZEC and NEAR from where it startedClear
  • Private AI stays a niche thing instead of something companies pay forWatch
  • Venice falls behind the bigger AI companies it is being compared toWatch
Methodology

What every number on this page means

Rebuild any number here from the formulas and sources below.

Free-float cap

VVV spot price multiplied by the immediately circulating float. Free float is Venice-reported circulating supply less every VVV committed to the staking contract, which covers plain staking and DIEM locking together.

free_float = venice_circulating_supply - sVVV_total_supply
free_float_cap = vvv_price * free_float

This is not the conventional crypto market capitalization, which currently reads $1.17B. It is not enterprise value and it is not equity value.

Comparator levels

implied_vvv_price = comparator_valuation / free_float
multiple_to_comparator = comparator_valuation / free_float_cap

This compares valuations only. VVV gives you no ownership, profit or legal claim on any company here.

What a large number does not mean

A $10B valuation is the last traded price times the supply. Moving it takes far less than $10B.

Burns

Venice buys VVV on the open market and sends it to the zero address. The tokens are not destroyed at the ERC-20 level, so on-chain totalSupply still counts them. Venice's reported total supply nets them out, and this page follows Venice.

burned = balanceOf(0x0) on the VVV contract

The 30-day pace scales what has burned since Day 0 to 30 days. The dollar figure uses today's price.

Business metrics

Revenue, users and usage have no live feed. Each is recorded on the day Venice published it, with the date shown.

Data freshness

Where each number comes from

Comparators

Why these three tokens

Picked at launch and left alone.

  • TAOBittensor

    The reference decentralised-AI network. The closest listed analogue for an AI token with real usage.

  • ZECZcash

    The benchmark privacy asset. Venice sells private, uncensored inference, so ZEC prices what the market pays for privacy at scale.

  • NEARNEAR Protocol

    A large L1 that repositioned around AI. A liquidity and attention comparator rather than a business one.