How Vivek Ramaswamy Got Richer While Pumping Millions Into Failed Presidential Campaign

[Music] hi everybody I'm Britney Lewis with Forbes breaking news joining me now is my colleague senior wealth reporter John hayatt John thanks so much for coming on thanks for having me Britney if our audience remembers all the way back in September you and I talked about V ramas Swami's GOP Presidential campaign that came to an end on Monday night in Iowa so before we dive into the actual conversation can you tell us what exactly un folded in Iowa on Monday night so the long and short of it was that the gramas Swami pulled in around 8% of all caucus goers uh votes so he finished in a distant fourth place behind Nikki Haley in third Ronda santz in second and of course Donald Trump in first who collected over 50% of all votes uh almost immediately the vras Swami uh announced that he would be stepping out of the race and endorsing Donald Trump and you compiled his net worth and I want to read a passage from your story from Forbes you wrote this quote the biotech founder and anti-woke activists spent Millions on his unsuccessful campaign yet he is wealthier now than when he entered the race 11 months ago what was his net worth in February and what is it today we estimated it was about 840 million in February and today it's a little over $960 million so a considerable bump of over $100 million huge bump that is like you said more than a million more than $100 million so how did he make it if he was pumping money into his campaign so his biggest asset is a drug company called Roy vant which he founded back in 2014 he still holds uh about 6% stake in that company and Roy Van's stock has done really well over the last year it's up over 40% and that has really driven the increase in the Swami's net worth uh because you know that asset is now worth over $600 million or so for him and he's only spent uh anywhere from 17 to 30 or so million dollars on campaign expenses we don't have the full tabulation of that yet because uh Q4 and January spending data has not been disclosed but over the first three quarters of last year he only spent around 17 million dollar on his campaign so um yeah he's doing fine voters in Iowa rejected ramas Swami but how does the public feel about Roy van I don't think the public really knows about Roy van to be honest it it's not something he spoke about a lot on the campaign Trail you know he mentioned his career as an entrepreneur and you know a guy on Wall Street but you know he never really dug into many of the details on Roy vent or the circumstances surrounding his departure from Roy vant uh he does write about it a bit in his book about how you know he felt that he could no longer sort of Express his thoughts as CEO of Roy vent as he leaned more into sort of Social and cultural issues from his Republican right-wing perspective um so you know I think by and large people don't know about Roy vant at least among American voters but I mean what's important for VI's pockets is that people on Wall Street know about Roy vant uh I mean the company did a s billion dollar deal a couple months ago selling one of its drugs to uh farmer giant Ro and you know majority of stock ists covering royant have a buy rating on the stock uh so I mean that bodess well for ramas Swami's net worth you and I talked about Roy Vamp back in September and a big theme in Viv R Swami's life is that he likes Roi return on investment that's even part of Roy Van's name and it sounds like he's getting that now I do want to Pivot to a different company and that is Strive Asset Management can you talk to us about that company and how much his majority stake is worth so this is a company strive that essentially sells uh funds to investors so these are exchange traded funds like the type you'd buy from Black Rock or Vanguard or State Street uh that you know are composed of different equities and designed to provide diversification although stries big selling point is that it's an anti-woke investment firm so it you know forars the the type of corporate activism and liberal uh ideologies or values that have been embraced by other sides of Wall Street and this is a company vake started sort of on a whim uh after leaving royan uh in 2022 he co-founded it with his high school buddy Anon FX and O over his campaign uh the company has grown pretty considerably uh it had around $500 million in investor assets when uh the vake launched his campaign last February and now it has $1.1 billion so in doubling its AUM uh that's not a bad haul we value uh his majority stens strive at over $150 million and that's based on uh a previous financing round which valued the company at about $300 million according to Hansen frer as well as another source familiar with the matter his campaign was really centered on anti-woke ideology so it makes sense that that is what that company is based on but can you talk to us about what else rounds out his fortune how much cash does he have on hand so we estimate he has about $240 million of cash uh liquid Investments and other stakes and private startups including the conservative alternative to YouTube Rumble uh that's a company as a Stak in he also has a stake in a a tech company called chapter uh which is sort of like a Medicare advisor uh Peter teal is an investor in that company he's also an investor in strive so you know VI has cultivated a relationship with with teal who of course is sitting out uh this uh campaign as far as you know his donations to candidates um um and yeah you know VI has a large cash pile and you know with interest rates going up or with interest rates having been up you know he's earning money on that cash as well um so yeah he's doing he's doing quite well I want to talk about what's potentially next for V ramaswami does it look like he has any interest in going back to either voy van or strive because this was his first foray into politics yeah a return to biotech appears out of the question for vake he repeatedly trashed the Food and Drug Administration on the campaign Trail as corrupt and as anyone in biotech knows you know developing drugs and selling those drugs you know that requires a working relationship with FDA officials and getting drugs over the finishing line so yeah any sort of return to Roy Vance or biotech more generally seems out of the question uh strive it's it's definitely possible you know he remains the controlling shareholder of that company according to its filings so you know he could come back as executive chairman or install himself as CEO but by all appearances it looks like uh VI wants to remain in the political fry uh as soon as he stepped down um after the Iowa defeat he flew to New Hampshire and he's already campaigning on behalf of Donald Trump trashing Nikki Haley and sort of re fashioning his campaign into uh appendage of trump campaign so uh I think we can expect to you know see him as sort of a trump surrogate at least for the next couple weeks something that's really interesting is when I was in Iowa over the summer he was asked a lot if you don't make it to the finish line here would you be a VP and he was pretty passionate about I'm nobody's second choice here I won't be a VP like you said he has not said a bad word about Trump he said I'm not doing that he wanted Trump to really pass the ton to him and voters to feel that that clearly didn't shake out the way he wanted to but has the Trump campaign said anything to the effect of they would consider him as VP they would consider re ramaswami for some sort of cabinet position yeah you know last night when Trump uh when VI was at a trump rally uh and you know after VI prais Trump uh you know Trump said he's going to be working with us for a long time so I think sort of hinting at the possibility of some sort of cabinet position or advisor role you know who knows Trump is notoriously you know fickle with this type of thing we remember back in 2016 Chris Christie uh got on the Trump train pretty early uh but you know Trump famously shut him out of any position uh in his white house so you know I think VI would love to you know engineer a cabinet uh position for himself and you're right right he has sort of repeatedly uh you know brushed off the idea of being Trump's VP but it doesn't look like Trump is interested in you know choosing be as his VP uh Jason Miller a trump Aid uh shot down that idea uh day before Iowa caucuses and you know Trump kind of went after V accusing him of deceitful campaign tricks just before Iowa as well and you know ultimately Trump picks people uh who can enhance his own popularity right we saw in 2016 by choosing Mike Pence he was able to reach that sort of Evangelical Christian wing of the Republican party uh with you know a governor uh like Mike Pence the question I guess is how how could VI help Trump expand his voter base I don't think he can really I mean VI styled himself as As Trump 2.0 and voters didn't really care for it so you know is VI going to help Trump pick up the type of you know uh Suburban voter who could help swing Pennsylvania in in the general election I I I don't think so so uh I think you know B will be hoping for some sort of position but um doesn't seem like there's any guarantees there well it definitely seems like his future remains to be seen either in politics or not John hayatt thank you so much for coming on and thanks for your reporting thanks Bren

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Length: 11min 48sec (708 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 17 2024