로빈후드, AI 열기에 편승해 2호 벤처 펀드 상장 준비

Just two months after listing its first venture fund on the stock market, Robinhood is preparing to launch a second. The company has filed a confidential registration for RVII, a standard regulatory step that allows it to work through the approval process before making details public. U nlike its first fund, which currently holds stakes in 10 late-stage companies — Airwallex, Boom, Databricks, ElevenLabs, Mercor, OpenAI, Oura, Ramp, Revolut, and Stripe — RVII will cast a wider net, investing in growth-stage and early-stage startups. It's a meaningful distinction, given that early-stage startups are younger and carry more risk but also offer the potential for greater returns. The fundraising target for RVII has not yet been set, the company said in a blog post . For its inaugural fund, Robinhood sought to raise $1 billion but ultimately fell several hundred million short of that goal. Despite the shortfall, the first fund has performed strongly. RVI — the ticker for Robinhood's first fund, which trades on the NYSE (New York Stock Exchange) — debuting on the NYSE at $21 a share in early March and has since more than doubled, closing on Monday at $43.69. Market enthusiasm for the AI prospects of the fund’s underlying startups has likely fueled the stock’s rise. The premise behind both funds addresses a longstanding gap in who gets to invest in startups. Under federal rules, only "accredited" investors — those with a net worth exceeding $1 million or annual income above $200,000 — can put money into private companies. That has historically locked ordinary investors out of the earliest and most lucrative stages of a company's growth. RVI and now RVII, are designed to change that, letting anyone invest in a portfolio of private startups through a regular brokerage account. "You can think of [Robinhood Ventures] as a publicly traded venture capital firm with daily liquidity. No accreditation requirements and no carry,” Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev said in an interview at The Wall Street Journal’s Future of Everything conference last week. Daily liquidity means shares can be bought or sold any day the market is open, unlike traditional VC funds, where capital is locked up for years. No carry means Robinhood doesn't take a percentage of investment profits, as conventional venture firms typically do. Over the past few years, the most valuable AI startups have gone from early bets to companies worth tens or hundreds of billions of dollars, and almost all of that appreciation has happened in the private markets, out of reach for most investors. Tenev's longer-term vision goes further still. “The aspiration is, if you’re a company raising a seed round and a Series A round — so, just first capital — retail should be a big chunk of that round, much like it now is in the public markets,” Tenev said at the conference . “And we should let those people in at the ground floor, so that they can actually benefit from this potential appreciation that’s increasingly happening in the private markets.” If that vision takes hold, it could fundamentally change how startups raise their earliest capital, with retail investors eventually sitting alongside venture firms, including in the earliest rounds, where the biggest returns are often made, a whole lot of money is lost, as well. Topics AI , IPO , retail investors , Robinhood , Startups , Venture When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission . This doesn’t affect our editorial independence. Marina Temkin Reporter, Venture Marina Temkin is a venture capital and startups reporter at TechCrunch. Prior to joining TechCrunch, she wrote about VC for PitchBook and Venture Capital Journal. Earlier in her career, Marina was a financial analyst and earned a CFA charterholder designation. You can contact or verify outreach from Marina by emailing marina.temkin@techcrunch.com or via encrypted message at +1 347-683-3909 on Signal. View Bio May 27 Athens, Greece StrictlyVC Athens is up next. Hear unfiltered insights straight from Europe’s tech leaders and connect with the people shaping what’s ahead. Lock in your spot before it’s gone. REGISTER NOW Most Popular Fintech startup Parker files for bankruptcy Anthony Ha Laid-off Oracle workers tried to negotiate better severance. Oracle said no. Julie Bort San Francisco's housing market has lost its mind Connie Loizos Hackers deface school login pages after claiming another Instructure hack Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai Zack Whittaker Google unveils Whoop-like screenless Fitbit Air Aisha Malik Five architects of the AI economy explain where the wheels are coming off Connie Loizos Hackers steal students' data during breach at education tech giant Instructure Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai