Ribbit Capital was an early backer of Robinhood, Coinbase, Nubank, Revolut, Affirm and other major fintech firms.
- Robinhood director and Ribbit Capital founder Meyer Malka bought 250,000 shares worth about $20.2 million.
- The firm reported record platform assets of $377 billion in May, up 9% month-over-month and 48% year-over-year.
- CEO Vlad Tenev said Robinhood Securities has been approved to serve as an underwriter, expanding the company's role in future IPOs.
Shares of Robinhood Markets, Inc. (HOOD) slipped 1% in premarket trading on Wednesday even after a veteran fintech investor increased his bet on the retail brokerage giant amid record platform assets and plans to challenge Wall Street's grip on IPOs.
HOOD stock slipped over 1% on Tuesday to end at $83.77.
Fintech Veteran Doubles Down On HOOD
A fresh regulatory filing from Tuesday showed that Robinhood director and Ribbit Capital founder Meyer Malka bought 250,000 shares last week at $80.74 per share for $20.2 million. After the transaction, entities affiliated with Malka own over 8 million HOOD shares through investment funds, trusts and related entities.
Ribbit Capital is one of the most successful fintech-focused venture firms. The company was an early investor in Robinhood, Coinbase, Nubank, Revolut, Affirm, Brex, Credit Karma and Sea Group, among others. The firm was one of Robinhood's earliest institutional backers, participating in its Series A round in 2014. Ribbit also helped lead emergency financing during the 2021 GameStop trading frenzy.
HOOD Sees Surge In Trading Activity
The insider buy came alongside a strong May operating update, with total platform assets climbing to a record $377 billion at the end of May, up 9% from April and 48% from a year earlier. Funded customers increased to 27.7 million, while net deposits totaled $5.6 billion during the month.
Trading activity remained particularly strong. Equity trading volume surged 27% month-over-month and 75% year-over-year to $315 billion, while average daily equity trading volume jumped 84% from a year ago to $15.8 billion. Meanwhile, options contracts traded rose 29% year-over-year to 231 million, while event contracts hit 3.9 billion in May, up 22% from April. Margin balances climbed to a record $19.5 billion, more than doubling from a year earlier.
HOOD Targets Bigger IPO Role
Meanwhile, CEO Vlad Tenev is positioning Robinhood to play a bigger role in a blockbuster IPO cycle. Tenev revealed on X that Robinhood Securities has been approved to serve as an underwriter, allowing the company to move beyond its current role as a selling-group participant in public offerings.
"Since IPO Access launched in 2021, we've watched retail go from an afterthought to a key part of how companies plan an IPO," Tenev said. "The question changed from 'why allocate to retail at all?' to 'how big can the allocation be?'" Tenev called becoming an underwriter the "natural next step" for Robinhood and added: "We intend to be disruptive in this space."
The timing could not be better. OpenAI confidentially filed for an IPO this week, joining Anthropic and SpaceX in a wave of potential mega-listings. SpaceX is targeting a valuation of $1.8 trillion, while Anthropic and OpenAI were most recently valued at $965 billion and $852 billion, respectively.
How Do Retail Traders Feel About HOOD?
On Stocktwits, retail sentiment for HOOD slipped to ‘neutral’ from ‘extremely bullish’ levels a week ago amid a 35% rise in 24-hour message volumes.
One user said, “$HOOD my gut feeling is that it will hit $90 by friday helped by SpaceX's IPO, which will tank to below $100 on Day 1.”
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Another user said, “User growth is steady, but platform monetization is absolutely crushing it. Feels like $HOOD is quietly becoming a beast in the financial world.”
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HOOD stock has climbed 14% over the past year.
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