OUTsider INsights #8 – Mark Creaser, DSV Fund – Astrid Intelligence

By: Tao Outsider

Today we have Mark Creaser, CEO of DSV Fund, one of the earliest and most active capital allocators in the Bittensor ecosystem. He is also the CEO of Astrid, Subnet 127 on $dTAO, and a builder and long-term strategist in $TAO, with a rare mix of technical, economic, and philosophical understanding of the network. If you’re not following him yet (on X), now is the time: @MarkCreaser

OUTSIDER 1: Mark, allow me to say this: I consider you the Gentleman of the Bittensor community. Always kind, attentive, and patient….

I’ve heard that 2026 will be the year of integration between subnets, that it will be the year of skepticism (given what happened with subnet 67), and also the year when $TAO reaches a new all-time high, and when some subnets start to break out of the bubble. From your point of view, as someone fully committed to Bittensor through DSF Fund and Subnet 127, Astrid, what do you honestly expect from $TAO Bittensor and the subnets in 2026?

Mark Creaser 1: First off, I appreciate the generous intro – that’s very kind.

On TAO, we all know that predictions have a habit of making people look silly.

Directionally, it’s the part of the puzzle I’m most confident in – long term, we’re as sure as we can be that number goes up. Beyond that, nobody really knows. It’s the thing we have the least control over in the short term. People, sentiment, liquidity, macro economics, geopolitics, regulation – it all feeds in.

On Bittensor itself, I think the network is in a better place than ever. The community is strong, there’s loads of good content being produced, and live events like Exploit and Proof of Talk will be real focal points in 2026. From an investor perspective, early last year felt different. In March and April, I think people were investing with longer time horizons – backing teams and visions with patience. As the year went on, that patience thinned and timeframes shortened, with more people chasing quick wins. Tenex may have changed that, or at least forced a few people to think. If you don’t really know who and what you’re investing in – you’re just gambling.

On subnets, it’s no longer enough to just exist. It’s much harder now for teams to sit back and do nothing. There’s more pressure to clearly articulate what they do, communicate regularly, and show progress. That’s a good thing. More real-world revenue is flowing into subnets, and that’s what actually matters. The ones that can prove utility and demand will survive. The rest won’t – and that’s a good thing.

OUTSIDER 2: Mark, you recently outlined the strategy for Astrid. In my view, Astrid’s core business is to operate as a capital allocation infrastructure within Bittensor. The goal is to attract external capital and use owner emissions to make human and algorithmic investment decisions, injecting that capital into other subnets through alpha purchases and staking, in order to absorb alpha, reduce sell pressure, and build a long-term treasury using the incentive mechanism.

After this was published, Bittensor founder Const raised concerns that subnets where miners do not produce something concrete tend to be unsustainable and risk becoming money chasing money rather than creating real ecosystem value. In response to that criticism, your partner Siam Kidd clarified that Astrid miners would have two practical roles.

First, acting as a liquidity sink, allowing holders and miners from other subnets to deposit alpha, lock it long term, and receive Astrid alpha in return. Second, participating in Astrid Arena, where algorithmic agents compete to outperform human benchmarks in allocation and trading, using the incentive mechanism to turn performance into learning and potential buybacks.

With that context, and for clarity for our readers, my question is straightforward.

Does Astrid’s plan remain exactly as presented, or will you incorporate Const’s criticism into the subnet’s design? And in practical terms, what will move Astrid beyond being perceived as a sophisticated financial structure toward being recognized as a subnet that produces structural value for Bittensor, aligned with the protocol’s emission and incentive model?

Mark Creaser 2: I understand Const’s concern, and of course it comes from the right place. He’s been consistently clear about what Bittensor is for, and I agree wholeheartedly: a subnet where miners never actually need to do anything shouldn’t exist. Those 128 slots are incredibly valuable, and any slot that isn’t generating real value for the network drags the rest down. That’s not what Astrid is doing. We have big plans, and while some elements of our vision don’t need a subnet, other parts very clearly do. Astrid Arena is the first example of that, and it won’t be the last.

Leo Mercier has been working on this idea for a long time, well before Astrid existed. The original concept was called SigmaArena – using Bittensor’s incentive mechanism to develop AI trading and allocation agents through competition. The core idea hasn’t changed. We’re simply building a more powerful structure around it.

Astrid Arena will run on SN127. Agents are paper-traded under live market conditions and ranked on performance. Emissions aren’t paid for participation – they’re paid for results. The strongest agents are rewarded, weaker ones fall away. It’s exactly what subnets were designed to do, and it wouldn’t work without miners doing real work. Over time, I expect SN127 to support additional incentive mechanisms as well – each one measurable, explicit, and aligned with what Bittensor does best: developing intelligence through competition.

So Astrid isn’t “finance for finance’s sake.” We’ll use our subnet to host incentive mechanisms that produce real output. Our clear goal is to strengthen Bittensor, not weigh it down.

OUTSIDER 3: I think your answer was clear and well grounded. From here on, it’s about execution. Over time, results tend to bring trust with everyone.

Moving forward, I looked into your background. You joined the Bittensor ecosystem roughly a year ago, and things have moved extremely fast since then. Today you are CEO of DSV Fund, an advisor to subnets, and CEO of your own subnet, Astrid. That leads me to my final question. How did you first meet Siam Kidd, how did you originally discover Bittensor, and at what point did you decide to meaningfully shift your focus and attention toward the Bittensor ecosystem.

Mark Creaser 3: Siam and I actually go back a long way – we first met in 2012 and we got on well, so we stayed in touch. I followed his work, read his books on crypto, and enjoyed his company. He’s sharp, switched on, and genuinely cares about people. At the end of 2024, I saw that he’d launched a crypto hedge fund, DSV. I messaged him and said I wanted to invest. At that point, my conviction was in Siam himself rather than in any specific thesis. I trusted his judgment.

I became DSV’s first real investor, and Siam asked if I could get involved and help build the fund. I came in as a partner and initially took on the CMO role. Over the following months, as I spent more time inside the fund, I learned much more about Bittensor and gradually started to share Siam’s conviction.

Things accelerated from there. We went to TOKEN2049 in Dubai together, where we met people like John Durbin, Nigel Grant, and James Ross. That trip was pivotal – it led to us starting to invest into subnets through OTC deals.

A couple of months later we were in Paris for Proof of Talk. That’s where we had the idea for Revenue Search, and it’s also where I agreed to step into the CEO role and properly lead DSV.

From that point on, I committed to this ecosystem fully. I’m actually answering this in an airport lounge on my way to Davos with a small group from Bittensor. I’m all in.

Siam and I are both serious about being positive ambassadors for Bittensor. We’ll take any call, talk to anyone, and help wherever we can. We believe that openness and contribution matter.

Towards the end of last year, we were given the opportunity to step into an existing PLC that was already investing in crypto. It held Bitcoin, ETH, and Solana. We sold all of that and bought TAO. That company is Astrid Intelligence, and it’s now another way we’re investing directly into the Bittensor ecosystem alongside DSV.

So while things may look like they moved very fast from the outside, for me it was a steady progression – trust in a person, growing conviction in the thesis, and a natural decision to commit fully once the inevitability of Bittensor became clear.

OUTSIDER: Mark, thank you for the answer and for sharing your journey so openly. It’s clear that while things may look fast from the outside, the progression was built on trust, growing conviction, and deliberate commitment. Wishing you a great trip to Davos and a strong, productive year ahead for you, DSV, Astrid, and the broader Bittensor ecosystem. The door is always open at OUTsider INsights. I look forward to having you back soon as this story continues to unfold.