Global Venture Funding Dipped $10 Billion in February

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Global venture capital funding showed signs of a slowdown in February, with startup investors pouring $10 billion less into companies than they did in January, according to Crunchbase data.

VC investors globally cut $52 billion in checks last month, down 16% from $62 billion in January, per Crunchbase. While the $52 billion figure still represents a 24% year-on-year increase in startup funding compared to February 2021 ($42 billion), the monthly decline indicates that investors have grown increasingly cautious amid headwinds like inflation, stock market turmoil and the impact of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The pullback is also striking considering the historic levels of VC funding seen recently. As Crunchbase noted, 2021 saw new monthly venture funding records set on four separate occasions: in January, March, June and November. The data platform added that while venture funding typically dips due to cutbacks in late-stage and growth funding, this time it also saw a 17% monthly dip in early-stage funding, as well.

Still, there remains ample interest and activity among growth investors, in particular. Crunchbase cited investment giants like Tiger Global, Insight Partners and SoftBank as having led or co-led more funding rounds this February than they did in January, despite public tech stocks taking a battering. Tiger Global has also shown a robust appetite for early-stage companies as well—with the firm’s partners having reportedly committed $1 billion dollars of their own cash to invest in seed-stage funds.

That isn’t the case for all investors, however, with major investors like Sequoia Capital, Temasek, Fidelity and Goldman Sachs all leading fewer large ($100 million-plus) rounds in February than usual, according to Crunchbase.