Venture capital giant Sequoia Capital has written off its entire investment in the now-insolvent crypto exchange FTX.
In a note to investors on Wednesday, Sequoia said that it was marking down its FTX investment to $0. The firm said it had limited exposure to the crypto exchange, despite investing a total of $214 million in it through two of its funds.
Sequoia disclosed a $150 million investment in FTX.cm and its U.S.-based subsidiary FTX US from its Global Growth Fund III. The firm also invested $63.5 million in both FTX entities through its SCGE Fund L.P.
FTX-related entities made up less than 3% of the Growth Fund’s committed capital, and the loss has been offset by $7.5 billion in the funds other “realized and unrealized gains,” said Sequoia. The firm also said that the amount invested in FTX by the SCGE Fund represented less than 1% of the total fund value.
“We are in the business of taking risk. Some investments will surprise to the upside, and some will surprise to the downside. We do not take this responsibility lightly and do extensive research through due diligence on every investment we make,” said Sequoia.
Some investors viewed Sequoia’s disclosure as a way to manage the bad PR associated with being invested in FTX.
It is likely that other large venture capital giants will report similar losses in the days to come. The once-prominent crypto exchange attracted funding from several high profile names in the space, including BlackRock, Tiger Global and SoftBank.
FTX’s $400 million Series C funding round in January saw the company valued at $32 billion, as per research from The Block.
