Peter Thiel co-founded Valar Ventures, which specialises in providing start-up capital to financial services tech companies. Photo / Getty Images
Jeffrey Epstein, the late financier and sex offender, started by putting $66 million into Valar Ventures, a firm backed by Peter Thiel. Today that investment is worth about $282 million.
Jeffrey Epstein, the registered sex offender, met with many powerful people in finance and business during his career, but the financier invested with only a few of them.
One of those people was Peter Thiel, the Silicon Valley billionaire.
In 2015 and 2016, Epstein put US$40 million ($66m) into two funds managed by Valar Ventures, a New York firm that was co-founded by Thiel. Today that investment is worth nearly US$170m, ($282m) according to a confidential financial analysis of the late Epstein’s estate reviewed by The New York Times and a statement provided by a Valar spokesperson.
The investment in Valar, which specialises in providing startup capital to financial services tech companies, is the largest asset still held by Epstein’s estate, some six years after he died by suicide in federal custody while awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges.
Epstein’s investment with Thiel’s firm has not been previously reported or publicly disclosed.
There’s a good chance much of the windfall will not go to any of the roughly 200 victims whom the disgraced financier abused when they were teenagers or young women. Those victims have already received monetary settlements from the estate, which required them to sign broad releases that gave up the right to bring future claims against it or individuals associated with it.
The money is more likely to be distributed to one of Epstein’s former girlfriends and two of his long-term advisers, who have been named the beneficiaries of his estate.
That outcome doesn’t sit well with one of the lawyers who fought for years to help the women receive restitution. David Boies, who represented several of Epstein’s victims, said federal authorities seemed to lose interest after Epstein’s death and the successful conviction of Ghislaine Maxwell, his former companion, on sex-trafficking charges.
He said prosecutors in New York had made a mistake in not going for civil forfeiture after Epstein took his own life, which would have allowed the federal Government to potentially seize the remaining assets.
“While we are grateful for the Government’s prosecution of Epstein and Maxwell, the truth is that, both before and afterwards, the Government was largely asleep at the switch,” Boies said.
Civil forfeiture allows the Government to seize assets suspected of being involved in an illegal action. In theory, some of the seized assets could have been used to compensate victims.
After Epstein’s death, federal prosecutors considered bringing a civil forfeiture action against his estate. But the authorities rejected the idea because the process may have delayed settlement payments to victims, said a person who was briefed on the matter but not authorised to speak publicly.
A spokesperson for the US attorney’s office in Manhattan declined to comment.
A college dropout, Epstein amassed much of his wealth by charging hefty fees for providing tax and estate services to a few billionaires like Leslie Wexner, a retail magnate, and Leon Black, a private equity investor. Black, for instance, paid Epstein more than US$158m in fees, and Epstein’s mansion in Manhattan once belonged to Wexner.
Thiel, whose meetings with Epstein were first reported by the Times two years ago, is just one more in a long list of famous and wealthy men who met with Epstein over the years.
Aaron Curtis, a Valar spokesperson, said in a statement that when a firm representative met with Epstein in 2014, he was considered a “well-known adviser to world leaders, top universities and philanthropic organisations”.
He said the firm, which is led by Andrew McCormack and James Fitzgerald, “hopes that the eventual distribution of these investments can be put to positive use by helping victims move forward with their lives”.
Jeremiah Hall, a spokesperson for Thiel, declined to comment.
Through a representative, the co-executors of Epstein’s estate declined to comment.
At the moment, the estate’s investment with Valar remains locked up, meaning it cannot be paid out in cash. Investments with venture capital firms are normally subject to long periods of lock-up to give the companies that are being funded time to grow.
Based on the estimated value of the Valar investment, Epstein’s estate is worth more than US$200m in all, according to the confidential report and estate records. When he died, Epstein had about US$600m in assets, which included investments, his lavish homes, artwork and jewellery. Over the past six years, the estate has paid out hundreds of millions of dollars in settlements to victims and the US Virgin Islands, where Epstein maintained a residence. The estate has also had to pay federal taxes and hefty fees to lawyers working for the estate.
Years after his death, Epstein’s story, especially the circumstances of his passing, has remained fodder for conspiracy theorists.
Thiel himself has discussed the importance of the federal Government’s airing facts surrounding certain conspiracy theories, including those involving Epstein. In an opinion piece he wrote in January for The Financial Times, Thiel said the conspiracy theory surrounding Epstein’s death was one of many that might be dealt with during the Trump administration.
FBI Director Kash Patel recently reaffirmed the agency’s determination in 2019 that Epstein died by suicide.
Just one major federal lawsuit remains pending against the executors of the estate, a potential class action filed on behalf of victims who haven’t yet settled with the estate. The lawsuit was brought by Boies’ firm, but it’s not known how many women would even qualify for a settlement.
In the past, victims have received settlements ranging from US$500,000 to US$2m.
Once that lawsuit is resolved, the estate will be close to beginning distributing money according to terms of the will Epstein signed shortly before he died. The will calls for the assets remaining in his estate to be distributed according to a secret trust he set up called the 1953 Trust, which was named for the year he was born.
Estate law normally does not give executors much latitude to deviate from how a person wanted his or her assets distributed.
The only known beneficiaries of the trust are a former girlfriend, Karyna Shuliak, and the co-executors of the estate, Darren Indyke and Richard Kahn, both longtime advisers to Epstein. The 1953 Trust has never been made public. Shuliak’s lawyer declined to comment.
According to a confidential financial document describing some details of the 1953 Trust, it was also Epstein’s intent for some US$19m in loans he had made to be forgiven, including some loans to entities that Indyke and Kahn are “closely associated” with. The confidential document, which was reviewed by the Times, was prepared by a special master working for the judge overseeing the probate of Epstein’s will in the US Virgin Islands. It was publicly filed on the court docket before it was later sealed.
At one point, one of the executors had predicted the estate would be worth less than US$40m after claims were paid.
But the estate’s assets began to swell last fall, after it received a large US$111.6m tax refund from the IRS. Some of that money has since gone to pay off a loan and legal fees.
In its most recent public court filing, the estate, as of March 31, listed its total assets at a little over US$131m, of which about $50m is cash. But that document notes it still records investments, such as the Valar investment, at their value when Epstein died nearly six years ago.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
Written by: Matthew Goldstein
©2025 THE NEW YORK TIMES
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