vlad tenev ceo and cofounder robinhood markets inc is displayed on a screen during his company’s ipo at the nasdaq market site in times square in new york city us july 29 2021 robinhood shares jumped 22 on friday a day after the ceo of a major crypto exchange took a stake in the retail investing app an entity called emergent fidelity technologies took a 76 stake in robinhood worth 648 million earlier this month according to a document filed with the securities and exchange commission the document also showed sam bankmanfried who leads the bahamasbased crypto company ftx is the sole director and majority owner of emergent the stake makes emergent the thirdlargest robinhood shareholder factset data shows shares of robinhood closed at 856 on thursday the day the document was filed that was about 77 below the companys july ipo price bankmanfried acquired the shares because they represent an attractive investment according to the filing which also says he intends to hold the shares as an investment and doesnt have any intention of taking any action toward changing or influencing the control of the issuer he may from time to time engage in discussions with management however of course we think it is an attractive investment too robinhoods communications team said in a tweet thursday evening in response to the news of the investment bankmanfried can also review options for enhancing stockholder value through among other things various strategic alternatives or operational or management initiatives according to the document it also said he could acquire additional shares ftx is one of the biggest crypto exchanges in the world it offers derivatives products for more sophisticated traders as well as spot trading and has become a rival to big names such as coinbase and binance it offers services in the us through a separate entity ftx us though robinhood got its start in stock trading it saw huge success when it rolled out its crypto trading platform in 2018 crypto trading has since become important for the companys bottom line in the fall robinhood revealed its testing a crypto wallet and said the waitlist for it had topped 1 million customers