Robinhood's second venture fund debuts, drawing retail money into private markets

Aug 13 : Robinhood's second venture fund debuted on Thursday, giving retail investors access to early-stage startups that have traditionally been out of reach for all but venture capital firms and wealthy investors.The fintech company raised $225.5 million in the initial public offering of Robinhood Ventures Fund II, which will invest in early- and growth-stage private companies.The fund will focus on current and former participants in the Y Combinator startup accelerator program, which has financed over 5,000 companies with a combined valuation of more than $1.3 trillion, including crypto exchange Coinbase, social media platform Reddit and ChatGPT maker OpenAI.Robinhood shot to prominence in 2021 by democratizing investing for mom-and-pop investors with commission-free trading. Since then