00:00Tell us first of all why the NYSE and why this fund? What's in it and what are you doing
00:06with it?
00:07Thank you for having me. So the purpose of Robinhood Ventures is not just to open access to private markets
00:14but to completely blow the doors off the hinges so that they can never be closed again.
00:19And we think that it's a big iniquity in capital markets that you have companies staying private at valuations in
00:27the hundreds of billions and retail investors get shut out.
00:32So Robinhood Ventures is a closed end fund listed on the NYSE that invests in private companies.
00:39The idea is we raise the capital in an IPO and then we invest that capital in private companies.
00:47And so far we've got a portfolio of frontier names in their industries.
00:53You mentioned Databricks, Aura, Mercore, Revolut, Ramp.
00:58Those are just some of the companies that are part of this portfolio and it's just the beginning.
01:04I'm just curious about the NYSE as a vendor. The primary exchange for your stock is the NASDAQ.
01:12Why do you choose the ICE exchange there?
01:17Yeah. I mean we you know like you mentioned we went public with Robinhood markets on the NASDAQ.
01:25And you know we we thought we would give NYSE a try because they have a long history of closed
01:33end funds which which this is listing on the exchange.
01:36And you know it's it's it's fun. The history of the Buttonwood agreement signed outside here is very much you
01:44know one of the birthplaces of capital markets.
01:46So we're excited to be a nice member. How do you I mean the mechanics of trading private companies means
01:54you have to either buy into it at the at the I guess VC level or you have to buy
02:02in the secondary market from employees and other shareholders.
02:06How do you do that. Yeah. So we've got an investment team. We're out there in Silicon Valley banging on
02:14doors meeting with companies.
02:16We're kind of in an interesting place because I think Robinhood is perhaps the only brokerage that has roots in
02:24Silicon Valley.
02:25And we're still actually close to the company is at the epicenter of innovation yet. We also have 27 million
02:31retail customers.
02:32So I don't really think this type of product has been possible until until now at this scale.
02:40Democratization. I mean kind of the reason that you cite for this Vlad it's at the core of Robinhood DNA.
02:46And I'm wondering if it's going to drive more products or if you can tell us about other products that
02:53are are aimed in the same direction.
02:56I mean this is like we view this as the the next front in our mission to democratize finance for
03:02all.
03:03We're we're working to democratize private markets and it's certainly not going to be done in one shot. Right.
03:10This is going to be a long process. And I see a future where it's not just late stage companies
03:17but companies at seed stage
03:19and series A have retail investors as a substantial component of their shareholder base.
03:25If you think about what's happening now with AI I think one of the big tragedies is that AI companies
03:33many many of the leading ones
03:35are private evaluations in the high hundreds of billions. And that upside up until now has largely gone to a
03:42smaller and smaller group of insiders.
03:45Wealthy insiders that just keep getting wealthier. So there's not much we can do about the past but our focus
03:52is on the future.
03:53And I think this is a first step in in changing things for the better. You're looking at companies that
03:58are now really as you mentioned
04:01in the heart of excitement over investing. Massive valuations like OpenAI or like SpaceX that could come to the public
04:09market.
04:10What happens when they start trading in an IPO? Then you I guess effectively cash out the closed end fund
04:15investors.
04:17Yeah. So the fund would have flexibility to hold buy more or sell. We have the ability to keep holding.
04:26I think we would think about any event as as an opportunity to re underwrite the companies. And I think
04:33the the value prop for companies
04:36that you know are part of the Robinhood Ventures portfolio is that you know nobody else can connect them to
04:43the retail audience in quite the same way.
04:46So we don't have conventional LPs in the same way that a venture capital fund would. And there's no carry
04:54to the fund.
04:55So, you know, we believe that it's a differentiated product, not just for retail, but also for for the company
05:01side as well.
05:02Vlad, can you just tell us as we get to the end here a little bit about the trading activity
05:08that you've seen on your platform?
05:10You have an incredible bird's eye view of what the retail investors are doing throughout this first week of war
05:16in Iran.
05:17As we see an incredible spike in the price of oil. What's your take on the equity trading activity on
05:24your platform?
05:25Yeah. Customer activity has continued to be strong. Trading activity is robust across a wide variety of names.
05:33And of course, we now offer a suite of active trader products that allows people to trade energies and metals.
05:41So you have our futures trading market offerings. You have Robinhood Legend, which is our active trader platform on Web.
05:51And so customers have continued to be active and you have a good mix of active traders as well as
05:57folks that are just seeing opportunities out there.
06:00And maybe they're not going in and out and taking multiple round trips, but they see it as an opportunity
06:06to keep growing their positions.
06:08So, yeah, we've seen we've gone through many ups and downs in the market, many geopolitical events.
06:15And, you know, the retail customers in our community who tend to be a little bit younger, you know, continue
06:23to take opportunities, look for them wherever they may be.
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