# Richard Craib

> Richard Craib is the South African-born founder and CEO of Numerai, the world's first AI-powered crowdsourced hedge fund. By encrypting financial data and opening it to thousands of anonymous data scientists globally - who stake NMR cryptocurrency on their models - Craib built a machine learning meta-model that now manages hundreds of millions in assets. In 2017 he pioneered the concept of a hedge fund issuing its own cryptocurrency. Backed by Paul Tudor Jones, Naval Ravikant, and JPMorgan, Numerai raised a $30M Series C at a $500M valuation in late 2025 and achieved a 25.45% net return in 2024.

- **Role:** Founder and CEO at Numerai
- **Organizations:** Numerai, DataProphet, Prudential (M&G)
- **From:** South Africa
- **Nationality:** South African
- **Education:** Mathematics and Economics, University of Cape Town, Exchange Student, University of California, Berkeley, Bachelor of Arts, Pure Mathematics, Cornell University
- **Known for:** Founded Numerai, the world's first AI-powered crowdsourced hedge fund (2015), Pioneered the concept of a hedge fund issuing its own cryptocurrency with NMR/Numeraire (2017), Named to Forbes 30 Under 30 - Finance category (2017)

## Career timeline

- **2007** — Began studying Mathematics and Economics at University of Cape Town
- **2008-2009** — Exchange student at UC Berkeley
- **2009-2012** — Completed BA in Pure Mathematics at Cornell University (Dean's List)
- **2012-2014** — Co-founded DataProphet with UCT classmates Frans Cronje and Daniel Schwartzkopff; served as Director of US Operations
- **2013-2015** — Built global equity fund powered by machine learning at Prudential (M&G), $15B AUM
- **2015** — Founded Numerai in San Francisco (October 2015)
- **2016** — Numerai attracted 7,500 data scientists in first year; raised $6M from First Round Capital and Union Square Ventures
- **2017** — Launched Numeraire (NMR) - world's first cryptocurrency issued by a hedge fund; distributed to 12,000 data scientists; named to Forbes 30 Under 30 (Finance)
- **2019** — Launched Numerai Signals - sourcing original stock market signals from any dataset, worldwide
- **2022** — Achieved 20% return despite broader market downturn; raised $100M in new inflows
- **2024** — Delivered 25.45% net return; AUM grew to $550M; launched Numerai Crypto (June 2024)
- **2025** — JPMorgan invested $500M capacity, nearly doubling AUM to ~$1B; raised $30M Series C at $500M valuation led by top university endowments (November 2025)

## Achievements

- Founded Numerai, the world's first AI-powered crowdsourced hedge fund (2015)
- Pioneered the concept of a hedge fund issuing its own cryptocurrency with NMR/Numeraire (2017)
- Named to Forbes 30 Under 30 - Finance category (2017)
- Grew Numerai AUM from $60M to nearly $1B by 2025
- Secured JPMorgan Asset Management as a $500M capacity investor (2025)
- Raised $30M Series C at $500M valuation led by top university endowments (November 2025)
- Achieved 25.45% net return in 2024 with only one down month
- Built community of 7,000+ Discord members and thousands of active data scientists globally
- Completed 1,000 tournament rounds generating 1,000 unique Meta Models (May 2025)
- Dean's List at Cornell University

## Latest updates

- **2025-11** — Numerai raised $30M Series C at $500M valuation, led by top university endowments
- **2025-08** — JPMorgan Asset Management committed $500M capacity investment, bringing Numerai AUM to nearly $1B
- **2025-06** — Numerai Discord server reached 7,000 members
- **2025-05** — Numerai completed 1,000 tournament rounds, generating 1,000 unique Meta Models
- **2024-12** — Numerai delivered 25.45% net return for 2024, with only one down month
- **2024-06** — Launched Numerai Crypto, expanding the platform's prediction markets to cryptocurrency

## Links

- Website: https://numer.ai
- LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/richardcraib
- Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/richardcraib
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLz3D6SeXhT3suJyt24WFN99z9VbcGdYp5
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/richardcraib/

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/richard-craib
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-05-11