The 22-year-old son of Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) has raised $30 million for a financial trading startup that is already valued at $300 million, according to a report, drawing attention to the young entrepreneur’s rapid rise as his mother remains one of the cryptocurrency industry’s most influential allies in Washington.
Theodore Gillibrand, who graduated from Stanford University this week, secured the funding round for American Perpetuals Exchange Corporation (APEC), a startup that plans to offer perpetual futures contracts tied to U.S. equities and stock indexes. Venture capital firm Lux Capital reportedly led the investment round, which values the company at $300 million.
The fundraising effort comes as Sen. Gillibrand has spent years positioning herself as a leading Democratic advocate for cryptocurrency and digital asset legislation. She partnered with Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-WY) on major crypto regulatory proposals and played a key role in advancing the GENIUS Act, which established a federal framework for regulating stablecoins.
“My son is a grown adult starting his own independent business,” Gillibrand said in a statement to the New York Post. “I have no involvement in it whatsoever. That said, I’m enormously proud of him and wish him nothing but the best.”
According to Fortune, APEC intends to seek approval from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to offer perpetual futures contracts, a type of derivative that allows traders to speculate on asset prices without owning the underlying assets and without traditional expiration dates.
While perpetual futures have become popular in cryptocurrency markets, APEC said its platform will focus on U.S. equities and stock indexes rather than digital assets. “The American Perpetuals Exchange Corporation will be offering perpetual futures on U.S. equities,” a company spokesperson said. “There will be no cryptocurrencies on the platform and the platform is not built on blockchain technology.”
Theodore Gillibrand previously worked as a fellow at crypto-focused venture firm Paradigm and interned at Andreessen Horowitz, one of Silicon Valley’s most prominent investors and a major player in the cryptocurrency sector.
The size of the fundraising round and the company’s reported valuation have attracted attention given Gillibrand’s age and the startup’s early stage. According to Fortune, the company has not yet launched its trading platform and must still obtain regulatory approval before offering its products to investors.
“It is clear that the future of these markets is not in offshore and unregulated foreign entities but rather in a regulated and institutional American company,” Theodore Gillibrand said in a statement.
