James Fitzgerald

James Fitzgerald is a co-founder and managing partner of Valar Ventures, the global venture capital firm he launched in 2010 alongside Andrew McCormack and Peter Thiel. The firm grew out of Thiel Capital and is named for a figure in Tolkien's mythology, in keeping with the Thiel-network naming tradition (Palantir, Mithril, etc.). Thiel largely stepped back from day-to-day operations, leaving McCormack and Fitzgerald to run the firm; Fitzgerald today heads Valar as its managing partner and is based in New York.

Before founding Valar, Fitzgerald was Chief Operating Officer and General Counsel of Thiel Capital, Peter Thiel's global parent company, where he helped manage Thiel's network of investments and businesses, including entities connected to Founders Fund and Clarium Capital. That operating role gave him a broad view across Thiel's portfolio before he spun out to build Valar's independent fintech-focused practice.

Earlier in his career, Fitzgerald practiced law for seven years in the New York office of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP, one of the world's leading corporate law firms. He earned his J.D. from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and his undergraduate degree from Brigham Young University (BYU).

Under Fitzgerald's leadership, Valar has become known as a specialist backer of "category-defining" financial-services companies in markets often overlooked by U.S. venture investors, deliberately targeting large, unglamorous problems in financial infrastructure rather than consumer trends. The firm has invested in roughly 90 companies, producing multiple unicorns, two IPOs, and around 20 acquisitions.

• Global fintech specialist: Valar invests in high-margin, fast-growing technology companies — overwhelmingly financial technology — with very large market opportunities, deliberately seeking talent and opportunity outside the traditional Silicon Valley orbit (Europe, Latin America, Africa, the Middle East, South Asia).
• Stage: Leads and co-leads at seed and Series A, and continues into growth rounds; historically Valar has been a company's first venture-fund investor (e.g., Xero, TransferWise).
• Founder-friendly terms: The firm states it looks for "exceptionally focused teams with large ambitions" and believes founders should "retain substantial equity and control," pledging to "move quickly and decisively" and provide the support of the "entire partnership" from day one.
• Sector concentration: Neobanking, payments, lending, wealth/investing platforms, crypto/exchange infrastructure, and accounting/financial automation.
• What makes them say yes: A focused team attacking a "boring but massive" problem in financial infrastructure in a large or underserved geography, with a credible path to high margins and scale.