여기는 Robinhood 창업자와의 대화: 개인 투자자의 의지는 모든 "똑똑한 자금"을 능가한다

Source: Master Investor

Compiled by Odaily (@OdailyChina); Translated by Azuma (@azuma_eth)

Editor's Note: Robinhood recently launched Robinhood Chain. The new wave of Meme hype associated with this network has re-ignited the long-dormant crypto market and is even viewed by some active investors as the start of the industry's next cycle.

Last week, Robinhood's founder and CEO, Vlad Tenev, participated in the Master Investor podcast. During the program, Vlad outlined Robinhood's history and path to success. He discussed everything from Meme stocks to Meme tokens, looked ahead to the investment value of asset tokenization and private equity markets, and emphasized that "retail investors are the true smart money."

The following is the full transcript of Vlad Tenev's conversation on the Master Investor podcast (edited for clarity and length), compiled by Odaily.

Opening Remarks

Host: Welcome to the Master Investor podcast. I'm your host, Wilfred Frost. In this show, we speak with the world's most successful investors, business leaders, and political figures, sharing the lessons and insights behind their success to help our listeners gain more investment acumen.

Today's guest is Vlad Tenev, the co-founder, Chairman, and CEO of Robinhood. Robinhood is a financial trading app that truly pioneered commission-free trading and has delivered numerous industry innovations since.

Robinhood was founded in 2013 and went public in July 2021 with a market cap of around $32 billion. However, less than a year later in 2022, during a broad market correction, the company's stock price fell roughly 80%, shrinking its market cap to about $6 billion. Today, Robinhood has made a powerful comeback. Its market cap is approaching $100 billion, currently sitting just above $90 billion, with platform assets under custody reaching $380 billion.

They're back, and stronger than ever. It's a pleasure to welcome Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev to Master Investor.

Vlad Tenev: I love that recap.

Host: Which part did you enjoy more? The ride up, or...?

Vlad Tenev: Probably now (laughs). Yeah, now is the most interesting time.

History Revisited: The 2022 Correction

Host: Let's start by talking about that big correction back then. This isn't just Robinhood's story; it's the story of the entire market.

You have a clear insight into the behavior of almost all traders, especially retail traders. Before that market downturn, which also impacted Robinhood's own stock price, did you see signs of a bubble in your customers' trading activity?

Vlad Tenev: Yes, during the pandemic, I personally had my suspicions, though I wouldn't have called it a "bubble" outright.

If you recall, in 2020, the US government began massive money printing, sending stimulus checks directly to households. But at the same time, if you looked at indicators predicting inflation, no one expected a significant rise.

For example, long-term inflation expectations implied by the 10-year Treasury yield were still around 2%. I remember thinking, how is this possible? The government is printing money nonstop, but inflation isn't rising.

The government didn't invent a perpetual motion machine; it can't defy economic laws. So, one of those assumptions had to break. Personally, what happened later wasn't surprising to me, even if it was a surprise to the broader market.

By the end of 2021, inflation started rising significantly, eventually reaching multi-decade highs, surpassing anything seen in the previous 30 years. When you see inflation go from near zero to 9% or 10%, a policy response was inevitable – interest rate hikes and monetary tightening.

In my view, this was almost inevitable and entirely foreseeable.

Host: So, can we simply say that the real cause of the market correction was the subsequent high inflation and interest rate hikes? Or were there signs of overvaluation even before that?

I'm mainly referring to the Meme Stock frenzy. In hindsight, shouldn't we have realized that these companies weren't profitable, yet their stock prices were doubling in a very short time?

Vlad Tenev: I think these things are all interconnected.

If you look at the timeline, the most famous round of Meme stock mania happened in January 2021, just weeks after a massive round of fiscal stimulus in the US. We could clearly see this in Robinhood's data too.

Whenever the government sent out stimulus checks, just days or weeks later, we'd see a huge inflow of money into the market. Looking back at Robinhood's massive growth during the pandemic, there were a few key reasons.

First, people had almost nowhere to spend money. Most offline activities were shut down. Everyone was at home, so digital activities – including investing in the stock market – became one of the few options still open.

Second, people had more time. They could learn about investing, follow YouTubers and various financial content creators.

Additionally, interest rates were at zero. If you remember, in 2019, the Fed was raising rates, pushing the federal funds rate above 2%. But then COVID hit in 2020, and the Fed quickly brought them back to zero.

And on top of zero rates, you had multiple rounds of fiscal stimulus. All these factors were jointly driving the stock market up.

Of course, in March 2020, the US stock market experienced a sharp crash. But it was a very short-lived crash, quickly forming a classic V-shaped recovery. If there hadn't been such rapid, massive fiscal stimulus and loose monetary policy, the outcome could have been very different.

Host: It's interesting. I was at CNBC at the time, and our ratings also soared. As you said, people had nothing else to do, so their attention naturally turned to the capital markets.

Vlad Tenev: Exactly. Everything else was closed, but the market was still open.

Retail Investors vs. Smart Money

Host: I started with this topic because I want to ask you later if you see similarities between today's market and back then. But before that, I want to touch on another thing.

I've heard that your customers – Robinhood is known for its retail focus – have actually performed better in the market compared to institutions. Over the past few weeks, we've had many guests talk about "smart money" and "dumb money."

Now, more and more people believe that the real "smart money" is actually the retail investor. Whether it was October 2022, April 2025, or March 2026, they successfully bought the dip during market downturns. Does this trend still exist? Are your customers still seeing the market more clearly than others and willing to buy when it's cheap?

Vlad Tenev: Absolutely. I've always thought so. A lot of times, the so-called "smart money" might be a bit too clever for its own good, which isn't always a good thing.

Institutional investing today has become increasingly indirect and abstract. Fund managers spend more time observing the macro environment and constantly adjusting portfolios based on various macro indicators. Often, they sell a stock for reasons entirely unrelated to that company's fundamentals.

For example, they might sell simply because of macro factors like tariffs. Tariffs force them to reallocate capital, leading to a counterintuitive situation where they sell companies like Palantir, even if it might be completely unaffected by tariffs or could even benefit from them.

Retail investors, on the other hand, think much more simply. They buy and sell stocks because they believe a specific company will do well in the future. So, when faced with macro events like tariffs or interest rates, retail investors often prove to be more resilient.

They focus on things like, "How is the company doing?", "Do I like its products?", "Is revenue growing?", "Are margins improving?", "How's the Rule of 40?"

These are still relatively professional analyses, but they won't just dump all their stocks and allocate to fixed income because "the Russia-Ukraine conflict happened," which is what many institutional investors tend to do.

Current Stock Market: A Bubble Similar to 2022?

Host: I want to talk specifically about Robinhood now. As mentioned, you went public in July 2021, shortly before the capital markets entered a very difficult period.

Do you feel like you just caught the last train? In the following years, the capital markets weren't very friendly to IPOs like Robinhood's.

Vlad Tenev: Yes. The IPO window was basically closed for several years. Because we later launched IPO Access, we had a front-row seat to the IPO market.

After the IPO window closed, it took a few years before a crack appeared. The IPOs of ARM and Instacart were the first to reopen the market. I think it was in 2023; in a way, they were precursors to the broader market recovery.

It wasn't until last year that the IPO market fully reopened.

Host: The reason I'm circling back is to ask if you feel a sense of déjà vu with SpaceX's listing, similar to Robinhood's experience – going public just before the market closed. If you had waited a bit longer, you might not have had the chance, as the market entered a two-year downturn.

Now SpaceX has successfully listed, and people are watching to see if all these other companies can follow. OpenAI has already indicated they might not attempt an IPO for now. Does this feel a bit like the past? How do you see today's market dynamics compared to back then?

Vlad Tenev: Everyone is asking the question: "Are we in an AI bubble?"

What complicates this question is that many companies are pouring enormous sums into AI, and the AI industry has already formed relatively clear business models.

These foundation model companies sell tokens to enterprise clients and individual users. OpenAI also has a substantial subscription business. So, unlike many past bubbles, AI companies today have real business models and growing revenues.

The real question has become: Will the enterprises paying heavily for AI transition from a "willing to learn, not too focused on cost" phase to one more focused on ROI? If they start measuring ROI strictly, will revenue from each client grow or decline in the future?

On the other hand, a crucial factor is that many enterprises haven't even started using AI yet, and the same is true for consumers. For instance, look at Claude Code. Its user base is probably in the tens of millions, far from hundreds of millions or billions. Therefore, the entire market still has a very long growth runway. Because of this, even with real revenues today, I still believe the entire AI industry is in its very early stages.

So, I think the logic for judging IPO timing is different now. Another thing I've realized over the years is that no matter what era we live in, we always feel like we're at a very important historical juncture, that what's happening is unprecedented, that we're on the verge of some massive change.

But looking back, these market cycles are actually getting shorter. For example, we just mentioned the IPO window closed at the end of 2021 and started reopening in 2023. If you zoom out, you see it's just a sinusoidal cycle.

No phase is permanent. Even if the IPO window temporarily closes, it doesn't necessarily mean it takes ten years to reopen.

Host: Based on your observations of customer behavior, do you currently see any warning signs similar to the 2022 market correction?

Of course, SpaceX is clearly not a Meme stock. It's a multi-trillion dollar company. But some might draw a parallel, saying it's being pushed to a very high valuation without sufficient profitability and could fall again.

I'm not comparing it to GameStop. I'm asking if you see any signs in your customers' trading behavior that remind you of the period before the 2020-2021 run-up and the subsequent 2022 correction?

Vlad Tenev: I believe the companies our customers are investing in today are mostly large, profitable enterprises at the forefront of their industries.

You mentioned SpaceX. Beyond that, there's Nvidia, Tesla, and other chip companies. The entire chip sector has performed quite well recently, and our customers are very interested in it.

So, the biggest difference between today and 2020/2021 is the existence of what I call "nostalgia" investing sentiment back then. Many Robinhood users are Millennials. They were investing in companies they felt were "unfairly beaten down" by pandemic-era policies – retailers like GameStop, movie theater chains, airlines, car rental companies. Even in the most optimistic scenarios, you couldn't call these companies at the forefront of tech innovation. In fact, they were somewhat being disrupted by market trends, COVID, online entertainment, streaming, etc.

Today is completely different. Our customers are now mostly investing in innovative disruptors, companies actively leading their industries. Of course, you can debate P/E ratios and other valuation metrics all you want, but I think there's little debate that these companies are genuinely changing the world.

A Founder's View on the Path to Success

Host: Let's bring it back to Robinhood. Before we talk about Robinhood today and its future, I want to look back.

In hindsight, what do you think was the fundamental reason Robinhood was able to rapidly gain users and market traction in its early days? I know commission-free trading was one reason.

Vlad Tenev: I believe three factors combined to make the Robinhood product resonate so widely.

First, as you mentioned, commission-free trading. Back then, other brokerages charged $7 to $10 per trade. We were completely free. This allowed us to tap into a new user base – mainly young people who didn't have a couple of thousand dollars to start investing.

Later, we also attracted active traders to the platform. For these active traders, trading a hundred or even a thousand times a month, the economic value of zero commissions was so immense that they were willing to use Robinhood despite potential shortcomings in features or tools compared to professional platforms. So, at least in terms of the business model, we won the competition.

Second. Besides pioneering the zero-commission model that the industry now broadly adopts, we also led the charge in mobile trading. Robinhood was a pioneer in shifting the brokerage industry to mobile. Before Robinhood, some brokerages had mobile apps, but the mobile experience was an afterthought, an add-on.

We bet that mobile internet would be the future and that people would primarily manage their financial lives through their phones. This wasn't just because of portability, but because the mobile form factor itself offered real advantages. So, we designed our product from the ground up for mobile. I think Robinhood truly created the "mobile brokerage" category and pushed it to become the mainstream form in the market today. Robinhood has always been the leader in this space.

Third, and I think this is very important, is the set of values that Robinhood the company represents. If you go back to the 2008 global financial crisis, many of our users were at an important life stage. I graduated college in 2008 and started grad school. During my first month of grad school, my co-founder Baiju had just started working.

That's when Lehman Brothers collapsed. The global financial crisis erupted. For our generation, the biggest takeaway from the financial crisis was that it was a problem created by the financial industry itself, but society at large had to pay the price.

Financial institutions made bad decisions. The costs of the crisis were, in a way, socialized, but those truly responsible faced few consequences. And the benefits of the post-crisis recovery flowed back to the financial industry itself, to those who already had assets, and to the "insiders" – the wealthiest 1%.

This led to the Occupy Wall Street movement and shaped a sense of disillusionment for an entire generation in the early