Y Combinator will hold its first in-person interviews for crypto startups in New York, focusing on fintech and cryptocurrency. According to The Block, the renowned startup accelerator Y Combinator will host its first in-person interviews in New York City, with a focus on fintech and cryptocurrency startups, aiming to support more companies in this space. YC stated on Wednesday: “This is the first time YC is taking a sector-specific interview process offline in this way, as they are meeting founders in ecosystems that are actively forming.” A YC spokesperson said the interviews will take place in person in New York on May 21. YC’s standard investment terms for selected startups are $500,000 for 7% equity. Since earlier this year, startups have also had the option to receive funding in the form of Circle’s stablecoin, USDC. Several crypto and fintech startups have already been accepted into YC’s Winter 2026 batch, including Sponge Wallet, a financial infrastructure platform for the AI agent economy; Unifold, a crypto on-ramp service; Sequence Markets, a unified platform for crypto, real-world assets, and prediction markets; and Valence, a cross-platform trading platform for prediction markets. Since its founding in 2005, YC has invested in over 5,000 companies with a combined valuation exceeding $1 trillion. Its portfolio includes OpenAI, Airbnb, Stripe, and Reddit. YC’s first crypto investment was Coinbase in 2012, and since then it has invested in over 150 crypto and fintech companies, including prediction market platform Kalshi, DeFi trading platform Axiom, and NFT marketplace OpenSea. Last year, YC partnered with Coinbase to support startups building on-chain infrastructure, referring to this shift as “Fintech 3.0.” https://t.co/Bjr0I5kjPX