--- alias: - Chamath Palihapitiya born: 1976-09-03 category: Technologists created: 2026-06-20 location: Sri Lanka (born); Ottawa, Canada (raised) summary: Chamath Palihapitiya is a Sri Lankan-born Canadian-American venture capitalist who ran Facebook's user-growth team, founded Social Capital, sponsored the Social Capital Hedosophia SPACs that took Virgin Galactic, Opendoor, Clover Health, and SoFi public, and cohosts the All-In Podcast. tags: - Person - ChamathPalihapitiya - SocialCapital - Facebook - SPAC - AllInPodcast - VentureCapital updated: 2026-06-20 --- Chamath Palihapitiya (born September 3, 1976) is a Sri Lankan-born Canadian-American venture capitalist who ran the user-growth team at Facebook from 2007 to 2011, founded the firm Social Capital in 2011, sponsored the Social Capital Hedosophia series of blank-check companies that took Virgin Galactic, Opendoor, Clover Health, and SoFi public in 2019 through 2021, and cohosts the All-In Podcast with [David Sacks](/people/david-sacks/), Jason Calacanis, and David Friedberg. He was named among the confirmed 2026 registrants of [Dialog](/organizations/dialog/), the invitation-only society cofounded by [Peter Thiel](/people/peter-thiel/), in the membership roster leaked to *WIRED* in June 2026.[^1] ### From Ottawa to Facebook Palihapitiya was born in Sri Lanka and raised in Ottawa, Canada, after his family emigrated when he was a small child and remained in Canada following his father's posting to the Sri Lankan diplomatic mission. He has described a financially precarious childhood and work at a Burger King from the age of fourteen. He took a degree in electrical engineering from the University of Waterloo in 1999 and began his career as an associate at the Canadian bank BMO Nesbitt Burns.[^2] He moved to Silicon Valley and held roles at the music-software maker Winamp and at AOL, where he ran the instant-messaging division, before joining Facebook in 2007. At Facebook he led the user-growth organization, the team credited with the data-driven acquisition and retention methods that carried the service toward one billion users. He left Facebook in 2011. His compensation at Facebook was paid substantially in equity, and the stake became the basis of the fortune he carried into venture investing, though no reputable source has published a specific figure for its size at his departure.[^2][^3] ### The 2017 Stanford Remarks At a Stanford Graduate School of Business event recorded on November 10, 2017, and widely reported the following month, Palihapitiya said he felt "tremendous guilt" about his work at Facebook and that "the short-term, dopamine-driven feedback loops that we have created are destroying how society works. No civil discourse, no cooperation, misinformation, mistruth." He added that he does not allow his own children to use "this shit." Facebook responded that Palihapitiya had not worked at the company in more than six years and that it had changed substantially since his tenure.[^4] Palihapitiya softened the remarks after the coverage, describing Facebook as "an amazing company" and stating that social media's impact to that point had been "mostly overwhelmingly good," while maintaining that the advertising business model "allows us to conflate and confuse truth and popularity."[^4] ### Social Capital and the Partner Exodus Palihapitiya founded the Palo Alto venture firm The Social+Capital Partnership in 2011, later renamed Social Capital, with early partners including Mamoon Hamid, Ted Maidenberg, and his then-wife Brigette Lau. The firm's portfolio included Slack, Box, and SoFi. Beginning in 2017 and accelerating through 2018, the firm lost most of its investing partners: Hamid left for Kleiner Perkins, Marc Mezvinsky departed, and Maidenberg, Arjun Sethi, and Jonathan Hsu left in 2018 to cofound Tribe Capital.[^5][^6] In 2018 Social Capital stopped accepting outside capital and converted to a holding-company model that invests off its own balance sheet rather than from limited-partner funds. The shift removed the firm from the conventional venture structure of raising and deploying third-party money, and it positioned the SPAC vehicles Palihapitiya launched the following year as the firm's primary public-facing investment activity.[^5][^6] ### The Social Capital Hedosophia SPACs Through Social Capital Hedosophia, a series of special-purpose acquisition companies cofounded with the financier Ian Osborne and tickered IPOA through IPOF, Palihapitiya became the most prominent sponsor of the 2020 to 2021 SPAC wave, drawing the "SPAC king" label. The first vehicle, IPOA, merged with Virgin Galactic in a deal announced July 9, 2019, at an enterprise value of roughly 1.5 billion dollars, with IPOA contributing about 800 million dollars and Palihapitiya adding roughly 100 million dollars personally; the transaction created the first publicly traded human-spaceflight company. IPOB merged with the home-flipping company Opendoor in a 4.8 billion dollar deal in 2020, IPOC with the Medicare Advantage insurer Clover Health at a 3.7 billion dollar enterprise value, and IPOE with the consumer-finance company SoFi at 8.65 billion dollars. IPOD and IPOF found no targets and liquidated in October 2022, returning capital to investors.[^7][^8][^9] Most of the completed deals fell sharply from their post-merger highs. On March 5, 2021, Palihapitiya sold his entire remaining personal stake in Virgin Galactic, 6.2 million shares at an average of 34.32 dollars for roughly 213 million dollars, while retaining an indirect position through Social Capital Hedosophia; the sale drew criticism given his public promotion of the company. A second SPAC series under the Social Capital Suvretta name, tickered DNAA through DNAD, produced two completed mergers that also collapsed and two further liquidations.[^10] ### Clover Health, Hindenburg, and the SEC Letter On February 4, 2021, the short-seller Hindenburg Research published a report alleging that Clover Health had failed to disclose a Department of Justice investigation, stating it had obtained a civil investigative demand covering roughly twelve aspects of the company's business and its Clover Assistant software, and accusing Palihapitiya of misleading investors. Hindenburg disclosed that it held no position in the stock. Clover subsequently confirmed it had received a document-preservation request from the Securities and Exchange Commission covering the period from January 1, 2020, tied to the report's claims.[^11][^12] Palihapitiya posted a "you're welcome" reply on the platform then known as Twitter around February 3, 2021, shortly before the Hindenburg report drew wide attention. He was later named in shareholder suits within the broader 2021 to 2023 wave of SPAC litigation alleging that sponsors profited from discounted founder shares while promoting mergers to retail investors. No reputable source has reported a formal Securities and Exchange Commission enforcement action against Palihapitiya personally; the disclosed regulatory inquiry was directed at Clover Health.[^11][^13] ### The Uyghur Remarks On a January 2022 episode of the All-In Podcast, Palihapitiya said, "Nobody cares about what's happening to the Uyghurs," telling a cohost, "you bring it up because you really care, and I think it's nice that you care, the rest of us don't care," and placing the issue "below my line" of concerns relative to supply chains, climate, American health care, and a possible conflict over Taiwan. The remarks drew immediate backlash. The Golden State Warriors, in which Palihapitiya then held an ownership stake, publicly stated that he "does not speak on behalf of our franchise" and that "his views certainly don't reflect those of our organization."[^14][^15] Palihapitiya issued a clarification, writing that he came across "as lacking empathy," that he acknowledged that "entirely," and that as a refugee whose family fled a country "with its own human rights issues," he believed "human rights matter, whether in China, the United States, or elsewhere."[^14] ### The All-In Podcast and the Political Turn The All-In Podcast launched on March 19, 2020, with Palihapitiya, Calacanis, Sacks, and Friedberg as the rotating cohosts known as "the besties." The program became a media channel for the cohort's positions on technology regulation, cryptocurrency, and defense procurement. Palihapitiya had been a Democratic donor in earlier election cycles before moving toward the technology-right alignment that the podcast came to represent.[^16] In 2024 Palihapitiya cohosted a San Francisco fundraiser for [Trump](/people/donald-trump/) with Sacks that reporting described as raising roughly 12 million dollars, and the All-In cohosts interviewed Trump on the podcast on June 20, 2024. Federal Election Commission records show Palihapitiya contributed to the 2024 effort to elect Trump. He had earlier held a passive minority stake in the Golden State Warriors, acquired around 2010 to 2011 for roughly 25 million dollars and sold in tranches in December 2021 and July 2022.[^16][^17][^18] [^1]: Cameron, Dell, and Yulia Almazova. "Leak Exposes Members of Peter Thiel's Secretive 'Dialog' Society." *WIRED,* June 16, 2026. https://www.wired.com/story/leak-exposes-members-of-peter-thiels-secretive-dialog-society/ [^2]: "How Canadian Facebook billionaire Chamath Palihapitiya plans to change the world." *The Globe and Mail,* 2017. https://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/rob-magazine/how-canadian-facebook-billionaire-chamath-palihapitiya-plans-to-change-the-world/article34109864/ [^3]: Levy, Steven. "The Untold History of Facebook's Most Controversial Growth Tool." *Marker,* 2020. https://marker.medium.com/the-untold-history-of-facebooks-most-controversial-growth-tool-2ea3bfeaaa66 [^4]: "Former Facebook exec says social media is ripping apart society." *Fortune,* December 12, 2017. https://fortune.com/2017/12/12/chamath-palihapitiya-facebook-society/ [^5]: "Social Capital is no longer raising outside money." *Fortune,* June 19, 2018. https://fortune.com/2018/06/19/social-capital-departures/ [^6]: "The mass exodus at Social Capital continues." *TechCrunch,* August 31, 2018. https://techcrunch.com/2018/08/31/the-mass-exodus-at-social-capital-continues/ [^7]: "Palihapitiya finds next '10x idea' with 4.8 billion dollar SPAC deal for Opendoor." *CNBC,* September 15, 2020. https://www.cnbc.com/2020/09/15/palihapitiya-finds-next-10x-idea-with-4point8-billion-spac-deal-for-real-estate-start-up-opendoor.html [^8]: "Palihapitiya-backed Clover Health shares fall on critical report by short seller." *CNBC,* February 4, 2021. https://www.cnbc.com/2021/02/04/palihapitiya-backed-clover-health-shares-fall-on-critical-report-by-short-seller-.html [^9]: "Chamath Palihapitiya's 14 SPAC and PIPE deals, tracking lifetime performance." *Benzinga,* March 2021. https://www.benzinga.com/news/21/03/20045351/chamath-palihapitiyas-14-spac-pipe-deals-tracking-lifetime-performance-and-the-past-weeks [^10]: "Virgin Galactic drops 10% after chairman Chamath Palihapitiya dumps his 213 million dollar personal stake." *CNBC,* March 5, 2021. https://www.cnbc.com/2021/03/05/chamath-palihapitiya-sells-virgin-galactic-spce-stake.html [^11]: "Palihapitiya-backed Clover Health shares fall on critical report by short seller." *CNBC,* February 4, 2021. https://www.cnbc.com/2021/02/04/palihapitiya-backed-clover-health-shares-fall-on-critical-report-by-short-seller-.html [^12]: Clover Health Investments, Corp. Form 424B3 prospectus supplement, 2021. U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/0001801170/000119312521029642/d120078d424b3.htm [^13]: "Billionaire Chamath Palihapitiya joins SPAC leaders facing lawsuits." *Crain's New York Business* (Bloomberg), June 2, 2023. https://www.crainsnewyork.com/finance/billionaire-chamath-palihapitiya-joins-spac-leaders-facing-lawsuits [^14]: "Chamath Palihapitiya says 'nobody cares' about Uyghur genocide in China." *CNBC,* January 17, 2022. https://www.cnbc.com/2022/01/17/chamath-palihapitiya-says-nobody-cares-about-uyghur-genocide-in-china.html [^15]: "Chamath Palihapitiya: Golden State Warriors distance themselves from co-owner over Uyghur comments." *CNN,* January 18, 2022. https://www.cnn.com/2022/01/18/sport/chamath-palihapitiya-golden-state-warriors-uyghurs-spt-intl [^16]: "All-In's bros explain how they got so rich and powerful." *Slate,* January 2023. https://slate.com/technology/2023/01/all-in-podcast-elon-musk-david-sacks-jason-calacanis-chamath-palihapitiya-david-friedberg.html [^17]: "Two tech investors to host Trump at June San Francisco fundraiser." Reuters, 2024. https://www.aol.com/news/two-tech-investors-host-trump-195355695.html [^18]: "Chamath Palihapitiya sells remaining Golden State Warriors stake." *Sportico,* July 2022. https://www.sportico.com/personalities/owners/2022/chamath-palihapitiya-sells-warriors-stake-1234680551/