By November 30, 2025 it is too early to know how 2021–2022 venture vintages will ultimately perform.

Key points:

• 2021–2022 vintage funds are only ~3–4 years into their lives. Industry data shows that most VC funds don’t start returning meaningful cash (DPI) until years 5–7, and often don’t reach 1.0× DPI (return of paid‑in capital) until around year 8–10 or later.(phoenixstrategy.group) Final outcomes for these vintages won’t be clear until the early–mid 2030s.
• Carta’s recent benchmarks confirm that 2021–2022 vintages are lagging earlier vintages in DPI: only a small minority of 2021 funds had begun returning any capital after three years, and 2022 funds are also behind historical norms on both deployment and DPI.(carta.com) However, this mainly shows slower exits and illiquidity, not terminal multiples.
• Analyses of vintage‑year performance show the 2021 vintage currently has weaker IRR than surrounding years, with median IRR around zero or negative, reflecting peak 2021 valuations and the subsequent correction.(techcrunch.com) But IRR and TVPI for such young funds are mostly unrealized marks and can change substantially if a few large winners exit later.
• The prediction is about end‑of‑life performance and LP sentiment ("you could return capital, you're going to look like a hero") for the 2021–2022 deployment vintages. There is not yet systematic evidence that, on average, these funds will end up only around 1.0× DPI, nor that LPs broadly view a simple return of capital on these vintages as an unusually good outcome. Available data only shows underperformance and delayed liquidity so far, not final multiples.

Because (1) typical realization timelines run 8–10+ years, and (2) current metrics for 2021–2022 vintages are still largely unrealized and could move significantly, Chamath’s claim about their ultimate performance and how LPs will feel about a mere return of capital cannot yet be judged as right or wrong.