Tiger Global made at least 15 private investments in Q1

Tiger Global Management made at least 15 new private investments in the first quarter, more than in any quarter in nearly three years, according to Crunchbase data reported by Institutional Investor.

Coatue began six new private investments in the quarter, down from 10 in the fourth quarter of 2024 and 15 in the second, by Crunchbase's count. The article calls Coatue the second-most active venture investor among hedge fund firms. D1 Capital Partners made two; Maverick Capital and Two Sigma made one each; Light Street Capital Management, Lone Pine Capital, Whale Rock and Third Point made none. Because Crunchbase gives Tiger's tally as a minimum, the five firms that made new private investments account for at least 25 new investments between them.

For an allocator weighing a commitment to a hedge fund manager's private-markets vehicle, the quarterly count is one of the few outside measures of whether the sleeve has a pipeline. A firm writing at least 15 checks in a quarter will, other things equal, deploy committed capital faster than one writing six or none, changing the deployment assumption behind a subscription. The diligence question that follows is how many new positions the manager expects to open each quarter, at what check size, and how much of a new fund the first year is meant to draw.

Crunchbase counted 345 Tiger Global private investments in 2022 and 289 in 2023; 15 a quarter would be about 60 a year, roughly a fifth of the 2023 figure. Coatue made at least 170 new private investments in 2021; six a quarter is 24 a year, and its quarterly count has fallen four quarters running, from 15 to 11 to 10 to six. The article attributes the slowdown to investors still shaken by 2022's sell-off, when private valuations were heavily marked down, and to an IPO market it expects to stay shut while equities keep falling, with tariff-driven declines making an early venture recovery unlikely.

Tiger Global led a $146 million Series C for the software firm Temporal Technologies at a $1.72 billion valuation. Coatue led a $250 million Series E for the browser company Island at $4.8 billion, according to the article. Firms specializing in biopharma and life sciences were, in the article's phrase, a little more active in the quarter. The next quarterly count is the test: whether Tiger's 15 marks a turn or a single busy quarter, and whether Coatue's run of declines stops at six.