Founders Fund, the venture capital firm established by billionaire entrepreneur Peter Thiel, has reportedly invested $200 million in the cryptocurrency market, split evenly between Bitcoin and Ethereum. This investment, which has been hidden until now, signifies a resurgence and growing interest in cryptocurrencies within Silicon Valley.
Founders Fund is a venture capital firm based in San Francisco that invests in companies building revolutionary technologies across all sectors, stages, and geographies. The firm has invested in several well-known companies, including Airbnb, DeepMind, Facebook, Flexport, Palantir Technologies, SpaceX, Spotify, Stripe, Wish, Neuralink, Nubank, and Twilio.
Founders Fund was the first institutional investor in SpaceX and Palantir Technologies and an early investor in Facebook. The firm has raised over $11 billion in aggregate capital under management across eight flagship funds and two growth funds.
Peter Thiel is a prominent figure in the technology and investment sectors. He is known for co-founding PayPal, being an early investor in Facebook, and co-founding Palantir Technologies, a data analytics and surveillance company.
He has also shown varying levels of interest in cryptocurrency. While he has expressed skepticism about traditional fiat money, referring to it as “crappy,” he has not been a consistent advocate for cryptocurrency.
However, Founders Fund, the venture capital firm under his helm, has made significant financial investments in both Bitcoin and Ethereum, reportedly dedicating $200 million to each of these digital assets.
According to insiders familiar with the situation, the investment occurred between late summer and early fall last year, a period during which the price of Bitcoin remained below $30,000.
Furthermore, this investment aligns with the firm’s historical role as an early advocate of cryptocurrencies, initiating Bitcoin investments as early as 2014. The decision proved lucrative, yielding a profit of approximately $1.8 billion when they divested their holdings in 2022 following the market downturn.
