Sequoia says its investment in FTX is now worthless

Sequoia Capital, a leading venture capital firm, said in a letter to its limited partners that it has marked down the value of all its investments in FTX to zero.   

The letter, sent today by the Sequoia Capital team and shared by the firm on Twitter, laid out details of its exposure to FTX across two different funds. In total, the venerable venture capital firm stomached a $213.5 million loss. 

“Sequoia Capital’s exposure to FTX is limited,” the letter reads. “We own FTX.com and FTX US in one private fund, Global Growth Fund lll. FTX is not a top ten position in the fund, and our $150 million cost basis accounts for less than 3% of the committed capital of the fund.” 

 
The letter goes on to state that although it took a $150 million loss on FTX, Sequoia’s Global Growth Fund lll is in “good shape” and has returned approximately $7.5 billion in realized and unrealized gains that offsets this loss. 

“Separately, SCGE Fund, L.P. invested $63.5 million in FTX.com and FTX US, representing less than 1% of the SCGE Funds 9/30/2022 portfolio (at fair value),” it continued, detailing a separate fund’s exposure.  

At the end of the letter, Sequoia said it is “in the business of taking risk.”  

“At the time of our investment in FTX, we ran a rigorous diligence process,” it added. “In 2021, the year of our investment, FTX generated approximately $1 billion in revenue and more than $250 million in operating incoming, as was made public in August 2022.” 

The letter comes after the stunning collapse of FTX, the exchange operator run by Sam Bankman-Fried. After a liquidity crunch at FTX and Alameda, a connected trading business, Binance briefly looked as though it might swoop and acquire FTX — but backed out of the deal earlier today. 

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