Stripe investor Tiger Global seeks to sell company stakes into secondary market

The vast majority of assets at Chase Coleman’s firm is in startups

Tiger Global has invested in hundreds of venture-backed companies, including payments firm Stripe, which was set up by Patrick and John Collison.

Tiger Global Management is seeking to offload hundreds of millions of dollars worth of private companies into the secondary market, according to people with knowledge of the matter.

The vast majority of assets at Chase Coleman’s firm, which managed $51bn (€47bn) at the beginning of the year, is in startups.

Tiger Global has invested in hundreds of venture-backed companies, including ByteDance, Snyk, Discord, Chime, and payments firm Stripe, which was set up by Irish brothers John and Patrick Collison.

The investment firm has hired an adviser to explore options to sell a portion of that, the Financial Times reported on Sunday.

A spokeswoman for the New York-based firm declined to comment.

Challenging period

Like many of its peers, Tiger Global is grappling with one of the most challenging periods that venture investors have faced in years. They poured money at a rapid pace into splashy startups, bidding up their valuations, only to get burned in last year’s tech swoon. Tiger Global marked down its venture investments by about 33% last year, resulting in a $23bn decline in value.

Now, as fewer companies are going public, investors are turning to the secondary market to find an exit. They may seek liquidity for several reasons: to provide distributions to clients, fund add-on investments to existing portfolio companies, or ditch companies they don’t believe will bounce back fast enough.