Investors aren’t impressed: Robinhood’s publicly traded VC fund down 15.8% in NYSE debut

Shares of Robinhood‘s first closed-end VC fund for retail investors ended their first day trading on the New York Stock Exchange down 15.8% from their IPO price of $25.

The vehicle marks the latest effort by Wall Street to offer private-market products directly to retail investors. Yet its disappointing first day of trading—at a discount to the fund’s NAV—may suggest investors aren’t as impressed by its holdings.

“That discount to NAV will be the proxy for how overvalued venture capital is,” Ram Ahluwalia, founder of wealth adviser Lumida Wealth, posted on X about the stock performance.

Still, the fund fits well into Robinhood’s long-term mandate to give retail investors far more options for where to invest their money, said Stephen Biggar, an analyst who covers Robinhood for Argus Research.

“You’ve got to give these things a little time,” he said. “The interesting thing will be what [startups] they get access to and what they invest in...that’s the big unknown right now,” he said of the price drop in its first trading day.

Shares of Robinhood Ventures Fund 1 were priced at $25 and began trading at $22 before closing at $21.05.

Robinhood seeded the fund with eight initial growth-stage investments, including Databricks, Revolut and Mercor as its largest holdings. Robinhood said the fund planned to use the IPO proceeds as cash on hand, earmarked for investment over time. It raised $315.4 million in IPO proceeds, selling 12.6 million shares. The vehicle was valued at about $658.4 million at its IPO price, with Goldman Sachs as the sole bookrunner.

In regulatory filings, RVI said it plans to maintain a concentrated portfolio of 10 or so startups. Its investment strategy focuses on hot sectors including AI, enterprise software, fintech and defense.

Robinhood is far from the only player in the market, though the category remains small. President Donald Trump’s administration has been championing greater access to private markets for everyday investors, which has so far mostly played out through efforts to add private assets to 401(k)s, as well as through closed-end and publicly traded vehicles like RVI.