RockawayX, a Prague-based digital asset investment platform with roughly $2 billion in assets under management, announced the acquisition of Relayer Capital on August 25. The transaction will see the hedge fund rebranded as the RockawayX Liquid Opportunities Fund, with founder Austin Barack joining the firm as chief investment officer to continue leading the strategy. The fund, which is open to new external investors, employs a directional long and short approach that includes pair trades to capitalize on fundamental views of crypto tokens while managing broader market exposure. According to the company’s statement, the move expands RockawayX’s presence in the United States, where Barack is based in the New York area.
Relayer Capital’s liquid strategy has generated an estimated net return of approximately 70 percent year to date through August 21, RockawayX said in its announcement. That performance outperformed an equal-weighted basket of bitcoin, ether and solana by 86 percentage points over the same period. Key positions contributing to the returns included Hyperliquid, Venice AI, Grass Network, Pump.fun and Zcash, with investment themes centered on artificial intelligence and tokenized real-world assets. The firm noted that the strategy has benefited from an increasingly mature onchain market environment.
Viktor Fischer, chief executive of RockawayX, said the acquisition aligns with the firm’s disciplined approach to adding strategies only when the team, process and conviction for outperformance are in place. “We have always been disciplined about adding new strategies to RockawayX,” Fischer stated in the announcement. “There are now crypto businesses with real revenues and strong fundamentals that we can underwrite, yet the market is still inefficient and misprices them,” he added. “That is a great setup for active investors.”
The acquisition builds on RockawayX’s prior expansion beyond traditional venture capital investing. Forbes reported that the firm entered the crypto vaults business through a separate acquisition in February, reflecting a pattern of growth via targeted deals. RockawayX also maintains dedicated infrastructure and onchain liquidity divisions that provide its teams with advantages in spotting opportunities from early-stage funding through public market trading, the company said. The new liquid strategy complements the firm’s existing venture capital and market-neutral businesses.
A Forbes report citing sources familiar with the matter indicated that RockawayX is targeting $150 million for the Liquid Opportunities Fund. The vehicle will focus on undervalued liquid tokens and crypto-related equities rather than relying primarily on overall market appreciation. According to multiple outlets including The Block, the deal comes as some peer venture firms have shifted focus toward artificial intelligence and robotics, yet RockawayX sees sustained opportunities in fundamental crypto investing amid recent market rallies.
Baker McKenzie advised RockawayX on the acquisition of Relayer Capital and the launch of its Liquid Opportunities Fund, the law firm stated in a September 2026 release. Deal terms were not disclosed in the announcements. The transaction adds to a series of steps by RockawayX to broaden its institutional platform in the digital assets sector while preserving continuity in the acquired strategy’s investment process.
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