Venture funding is back ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ Alternative Investments Nima Sanajian — Managing Director, Investments September 1, 2026 How our Venture Fund performed in Q1 Hi there, As a quick reminder, it takes much longer to value a private company than public ones, which is why we’re only able to send you the fund’s performance information for the first quarter. Dealmaking so far this year has been quite strong, but the last couple of months were relatively slow in terms of capital calls — the formal requests made by VC fund managers to spend investor money on a new opportunity. This isn’t unusual. Managers usually issue formal capital calls only after closing deals. That’s why, in the VC world, it usually takes three to five years for a fund manager to deploy all investor capital. So, when will the pace of new capital calls pick up? It’s hard to say. Deals are delayed for all sorts of reasons and, when that happens, the corresponding capital call is bumped back too. What we know is our current investment schedule is going according to plan. At the moment, 74% of our capital is deployed, and we expect that number to hit approximately 90% by the end of 2027. Performance The fund returned 3.4% in the first quarter of 2026, exceeding our expectations. At this stage, the businesses we hold tend to be focused on scaling to drive future earnings rather than improving their market value. That's why these gains were unexpected (but not unwelcome). Around 3.1% of this quarter’s performance came from valuation increases across our holdings, which invest in a select number of high-quality but difficult-to-access VC funds. These funds, in turn, invest in individual companies. The remaining 0.3% performance came from our cash ETF (UBIL/U), which holds undeployed capital for future investment opportunities. Strategy The Wealthsimple Venture Fund I accesses venture capital and late-stage growth equity through Accolade Partners, a top-tier fund-of-funds manager with a consistent track record of high performance. Accolade provides access to some of the most sought-after venture firms in the world, including Andreessen Horowitz and Kleiner Perkins — managers with a history of backing high-growth companies like Amazon, Google, Airbnb, Instagram, Slack, and Uber. Here’s a full list of the funds held in the Wealthsimple Venture Fund I, as well as the fund’s current allocation to each: Fund Current Allocation Accolade Partners Venture I Feeder, L.P. 23% Accolade Partners IX Feeder, L.P. 25% Accolade Partners Growth III Feeder, L.P. 17% Accolade Partners X-A Feeder, L.P. 9% Cash (currently earning ~4.1% annualized) 26% Investment highlights We can’t give out the full list of investments in our fund for legal reasons, but we do want you to understand the kinds of venture capital assets we hold. Here’s a late-stage growth investment you’re likely very familiar with: OpenAI: The San Francisco-based creator of ChatGPT and the GPT series of language models is quite possibly the most prominent AI company in the world. To remain on the leading edge of frontier AI research and development, OpenAI requires significant VC investment. Outlook The global venture market deployed more than US$500 billion in the first half of the year, the highest amount ever over a six-month period. Dealmaking activity remained robust throughout the second quarter, although the amount of capital deployed by venture capital funds came in below Q1’s record quarterly total. AI-native companies continue to dominate, capturing more than 70% of VC-deployed capital. Most of these companies are in the U.S., with other global AI hubs, such as China and the U.K., commanding significant VC interest as well. Given the valuation gap between AI-native companies and their non-native counterparts, and the explicit goal of many large VCs to invest in AI, we expect this trend to continue. We also saw the largest IPO in history — SpaceX — open with a valuation of over US$1.7 trillion. While its price has declined sharply since, the company’s stock performance in the first few days suggests the market is ready to absorb other mega-cap listings. We may see more blockbuster IPOs through the remainder of the year, including AI companies such as Anthropic and OpenAI. These exits could have some positive impact on our fund given our current holdings, but it’s more important to look at the bigger picture. Our fund is diversified across multiple funds and their underlying companies, not just AI, so a rising investor preference for major IPOs should lift all boats, including ours. As always, thank you for being part of this journey with us. If you have any questions about the fund or anything in this letter, please don’t hesitate to reach out through the feedback buttons below. Warm regards, Nima Sanajian Managing Director, Investments Did you like this newsletter? Your feedback (even if it’s just to complain) helps us get better. If you’re feeling chatty, after you rate us below you’ll get the opportunity to share more detailed feedback — including topics you wish we’d cover. 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