2025 Midas List: Top venture capitalists betting on the future

The 2025 edition of Forbes’ Midas List has revealed the top-performing venture capital (VC) investors globally, spotlighting those whose early bets on fast-growing startups have delivered significant returns.

Despite a slow market for public offerings and mergers over the past two years, select parts of the startup ecosystem are experiencing renewed energy, particularly around artificial intelligence (AI), space technology, and defence.

For the second year running, Alfred Lin of Sequoia Capital tops the list. Lin’s long-standing investments in Airbnb and DoorDash continue to bring returns, but it is his 2021 investment in OpenAI at a $14 billion valuation that has provided new momentum.

OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT, is now valued at $300 billion after raising $40 billion in April 2025. This sets a new record for the highest amount raised by a private startup, placing Lin firmly at the top of the venture capital world.

The broader startup scene is also shifting. Companies like SpaceX, Databricks and Anthropic have seen their valuations rise sharply. SpaceX, for example, is now valued at $350 billion, making it the most valuable private company in the world.

These developments have helped bring eight new names to this year’s list, including Shaun Maguire of Sequoia and David Sacks of Craft Ventures. Sacks, known for his role at PayPal, is one of four so-called “PayPal Mafia” members in the top ranks. He joins Reid Hoffman (2nd), Peter Thiel (3rd), Roelof Botha (13th), and Keith Rabois (17th), all of whom played key roles in PayPal’s rise.

This year’s list shows that venture capital is evolving. Lucas Swisher from Coatue represents large funds entering high-growth deals, while Elad Gil, operating independently, reflects a new model of solo investing.

Gil has made successful investments in defence tech company Anduril, work collaboration tool Glean, and AI search engine Perplexity. His approach, free of investment committees or large partnerships, shows how individual investors can still make a mark.

However, the 2025 Midas List also reveals challenges. After reaching a record number of female investors in 2024, this year only 10 women are featured. With just 11% of VC partners being women, progress remains slow.

As startups stay private for longer and fewer public exits take place, opportunities for qualifying deals among female investors may be limited. The hope is that as the next generation of startups grows, future lists will reflect more inclusive gains.

A few names show continued resilience. Doug Leone and Roelof Botha of Sequoia, Navin Chaddha of Mayfield, and Mary Meeker of Bond Capital have all maintained spots on the list for more than a decade. Leone, who handed over leadership at Sequoia in 2022, may be on the verge of a significant exit through Google’s pending $32 billion acquisition of Wiz, a cloud security startup.

The Midas List is compiled using both public data and private submissions from hundreds of VC firms. To qualify, investors must have backed companies that either exited through IPO or acquisition for at least $200 million, or doubled in private value to $400 million or more within the past five years. While both realised and unrealised gains are considered, the ranking places greater weight on realised exits. Credit is typically shared by a maximum of two investors per deal.

The 2025 rankings reflect where capital is flowing: AI, defence, fintech, and space continue to attract attention. As the IPO window slowly reopens and some private companies consider public listings again, names like Figma are being watched closely. For now, the Midas List offers a clear snapshot of those navigating uncertainty and emerging with successful outcomes.

Here are the top 10 Midas list investors (2025)

1. Alfred Lin, Sequoia – OpenAI

2. Reid Hoffman, Greylock Partners – Airbnb

3. Peter Thiel, Founders Fund – Palantir

4. Neil Shen, HongShan – ByteDance

5. Micky Malka, Ribbit Capital – Coinbase

6. Vinod Khosla, Khosla Ventures – Commonwealth Fusion Systems

7. Douglas Leone, Sequoia – Wiz

8. Hemant Taneja, General Catalyst – Applied Intuition

9. Fred Wilson, Union Square Ventures – Coinbase

10. Chris Dixon, Andreessen Horowitz – Coinbase