Wall Street used to be the dream destination for America's fast-growing startups and small businesses. But these days, you're more likely to find them taking investments via wire. Large venture capital outfits, sovereign wealth funds, and pensions have offered up mounds of cash, helping private firms shun the public markets and avoiding compliance overhead, quarter-to-quarter scrutiny, and market volatility.
In fact, increasingly, Wall Street is seen as the final destination for fast-growing firms — the place that execs and institutional investors head to cash out. It's a reputation which has only become more solidified by the row of recent IPO flubs. Firms like Figma (-81%) and Venture Global (-63%) have seen steep declines since their public listings last year.
The result is that everyday Americans aren't just left out of the growth; in recent cases, they're left buying the top. But what if there was a way to gain exposure to some of the private market crop before the harvest?
Brokerage giant Robinhood thinks it might have an answer: A publicly-traded exchange-traded fund which offers exposure to a portfolio of these fast-growing giants. Its new Robinhood Venture Fund I plans to go public in the next few weeks, offering exposure to companies like Stripe, Databricks, Revolut, and Mercor, among others.
It'll be a huge splash for private assets on public markets. But will it be a wealth-builder? Results may vary.
