TL;DR
Robinhood Ventures Fund II is going public at $25/share, focused on Y Combinator startups. Fund I (March IPO, $315M raised) holds Databricks, Stripe, Canva. Goldman, Citi, JPMorgan underwriting. 2% management + 20% incentive fee.
Robinhood is launching a second publicly traded closed-end fund that will invest in private companies from the Y Combinator ecosystem. Robinhood Ventures Fund II filed to offer 7.6 million shares at $25 each, with pricing expected after market close on August 12. The fund will trade on the NYSE under the ticker RVII. Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, JPMorgan, UBS, and Wells Fargo are underwriting.
The fund will target a diversified portfolio of early-stage and growth-stage private companies that have participated in Y Combinator’s programmes. YC accepts 500 to 700 startups per year and has produced Airbnb, Stripe, and Instacart. The fund may also invest in companies outside YC. Robinhood’s first fund, RVI, went public in March at $25 per share, raised $315 million, and holds stakes in Databricks, Stripe, and Canva. It was trading at $25.50 on Monday, up 2.8%.
The structure gives retail investors access to private startup equity through a product they can buy on a stock exchange, the same way they buy any other stock. The fee is 2% management and 20% of cumulative realised capital gains, the traditional hedge fund structure applied to a retail product. Moonshot is heading for a $30 billion Hong Kong IPO and several of the largest private AI companies are approaching public markets. A fund that buys into YC companies before they list gives retail investors a position they would otherwise only get at IPO prices or later.
Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev will present the fund via the Robinhood app and YouTube on Monday. The platform built its brand on democratising stock trading. Publicly traded private-company funds are the next step: democratising venture capital. Anthropic filed for an IPO this year, and the pipeline of AI companies approaching public markets means a fund positioned in YC’s portfolio could capture pre-IPO value across the sector. Whether a 2-and-20 closed-end fund is the right vehicle for retail investors who are used to zero-commission trades is the tension Robinhood is betting the brand can absorb.
