Robinhood's venture fund bets on OpenAI as retail rush for AI heats up
By Manya Saini
April 22 (Reuters) - Robinhood's venture fund said on Wednesday it has invested $75 million in OpenAI, allowing retail investors exposure to one of the world's hottest privately held AI companies.
Robinhood Ventures Fund I, which went public in March, aims to open up retail investors' access to private-company investments long dominated by Silicon Valley's largest venture capital firms.
OpenAI, last valued at $852 billion, has emerged as a poster child of Wall Street's AI frenzy and remains one of the industry's most closely watched companies, propelled by the viral popularity of its chatbot ChatGPT.
The buzz surrounding the AI major has also fueled a wave of investments and intensified competition across Big Tech and startups, as companies race to build and commercialize AI tools, drawing billions of dollars.
The investment also signals a thawing of tensions between the two companies that flared up last summer when Robinhood said it would grant eligible customers blockchain-based "stock tokens" for private companies, including OpenAI.
OpenAI later said it had not partnered with Robinhood, did not endorse the tokens and was not involved in the offering.
Once known mainly as a trading app for mom-and-pop investors, with business closely tied to market swings, Robinhood has steadily expanded into a broader financial services platform.
The company's shares, which have lost 22% so far this year, traded 2% higher on the news. The fund was last up 13%.
It is set to report results next week, with investors and analysts closely tracking how retail traders navigated volatile markets and how its broader suite of financial products performed.
"Regardless of whether rate cuts or a risk-on rally is coming, we think retail will prove more resilient than many expect in 2026 and see shares outperforming fintech peers throughout the remainder of 2026," analysts at Piper Sandler said in an industry note this month.
(Reporting by Manya Saini in Bengaluru; Editing by Diti Pujara and Tasim Zahid)