Morning Minute: VanEck Leans Into 'Degen' Culture with New ETF

A basket of assets built around millennial finance, the gig economy and digital gambling has been built into this degen index.

Morning Minute is a daily newsletter written by Tyler Warner. The analysis and opinions expressed are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of Decrypt. Subscribe to the Morning Minute on Substack.

GM!

Today’s top news:

Wall Street is no longer dancing around “degen” culture.

They’re embracing it.

VanEck is officially converting its Gaming ETF into the VanEck Degen Economy ETF, a first-of-its-kind product tracking the companies powering digital trading, gig work, betting and casinos.

The new VanEck Degen Economy ETF will launch in April 2026.

The ETF will hold public companies whose business models mirror the core behaviors of online degen culture.

Under the filing, to be eligible for inclusion, companies must generate at least 50% of revenue from one or more of these sectors:

It’s basically an ETF built around Robinhood culture crossed with Uber + DoorDash and DraftKings - all wrapped into one index.

“Van Eck is renaming its Gaming ETF ‘Degen Economy’ and switching to track a ‘Degen Economy’ index. To my knowledge, it will be the first fund or ETF with ‘Degen’ in the name.” - Jeffrey Park, Morningstar Research Services

It’s undeniable that this “degen economy” has been a real trend post-covid.

The question is - does it make sense to invest in this trend now going into 2026?

In fact, there’s a growing trend online “short degen” of folks who want nothing to do with wide aspects of this particular sector.

But that’s at direct odds of major trends like hypergamblification, an automated gig economy (Waymos that deliver food too) and the proliferation of everything apps (i.e. Robinhood).

The bull case for the Degen ETF:

The bear case:

Overall, if I had to choose whether to go long or short the Degen ETF, I would…

Go long. At least on a near-term time frame (next 1-2 years).

It’s hard to see these massive cultural trends breaking down in the very near future (even though there are signs that this trend is cracking in the younger generations).

And the investment thesis is very easy to understand.

Hey, you know your brother/cousin/neighbor/friend that stays in their basement, gambles online and orders Uber Eats all the time?

Ya you can bet on him continuing to do that.

So I guess I’m long degen culture. And now we all have a way to express that bet…

A few Crypto and Web3 headlines that caught my eye:

Here’s a rundown of major token, protocol and airdrop news from the day:

Here is the list of other notable headlines from the day in NFTs:

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