Dovey Wan, founding partner of Primitive Ventures, has spoken out to address the background of the investment in HOOK and the controversy surrounding its listing on Binance. She denies the rumors of “listing for friends only.”
Recently, Binance has come under scrutiny following an anonymous disclosure at the end of January, accusing Binance Labs and Binance of issues such as listing for personal gain and internal corruption, sparking discussions in the market.
Despite Binance co-founder He Yi’s recent responses to the negative rumors circulating in the market, there is still controversy within the community. In this context, Dovey Wan, who was named as the “chief white glove” of Binance Labs and claimed to be a close friend of He Yi, spoke for the first time this afternoon in an AMA with Wu Shuo, the founder of Blockshine, to respond to the related questions.
Dovey Wan stated in the AMA that the rumors of her “listing for friends” are false, emphasizing that she does not have a close personal relationship with He Yi. She further clarified that she is an investor while He Yi is an entrepreneur, and their roles are different.
In addition, she mentioned that He Yi already has several children, and their circles of life and mental distance are naturally far apart, so the so-called “close friends” relationship is unfounded.
As for the questions about the investment in HOOK tokens and the unlocking period, Dovey Wan stated that when Primitive Ventures invested in Hooked Protocol, the valuation was $30 million, and the token unlocking period is the same as other venture capital (VC) institutions, starting at the end of 2023, without any special treatment.
She also added that she and the founder of Hooked Protocol, Jason, were once in a romantic relationship, so she deliberately reduced her involvement to avoid potential conflicts of interest. She even admitted that she was surprised when Binance announced the listing of HOOK, questioning why the product was listed so early.
Dovey Wan’s response has sparked mixed discussions in the community. Some users support her statements, believing that she has a good reputation in the industry, transparent investment conditions, and that the accusations from Wu Shuo are one-sided and lack concrete evidence.
However, the focus of the discussions has shifted to the projects that Dovey Wan has been associated with in the past. Some users mentioned that she was an advisor for a similar project called StepN, which was ultimately accused of being a rug pull.
In addition, she is an investor in the NFT market LooksRare and publicly supported the anonymous team behind the project, emphasizing that the transaction fees would be shared with token holders. However, the team later withdrew the fees to Tornado Cash for anonymous money laundering, resulting in significant losses for investors.
The community criticized Dovey Wan, stating that she endorsed projects on one hand while emphasizing “DYOR” (do your own research) on the other hand, leaving many users who trusted her with significant losses.