Latino entrepreneurs reportedly struggle the most in obtaining VC funding

Yahoo Finance reporter Dani Romero details how Latino/Hispanic entrepreneurs are still struggling to obtain venture capital funding.

Video Transcript

SEANA SMITH: Latinos are a fast growing segment of the US population. Yet startups run by Latino entrepreneurs are struggling to raise the money that they need to build their businesses. Dani Romero is here with us. And Dani, I know you spoke with a venture capitalist who has a big focus on Latino founded companies. What did he tell you?

DANI ROMERO: Yeah, I spoke with Sol Trujillo. He is the founder and general partner of Latitude Ventures. And he tells me that Latino entrepreneurs have the most difficult time when it comes to getting access to capital and really scaling their business upward. He says there's a disconnect between the growing Latino population, as well as the attention paid to those entrepreneurs from venture capitalists and as well as these private equity firms.

The Latino population has grown 23% over the past decade. And a really stark data point from Crunchbase says that it shows that Latino entrepreneurs received about 2% of venture capital funding in 2021. So it is a really big struggle for a lot of them, yes.

RACHELLE AKUFFO: So then, Dani, what's being done to then better support these Latino founders?

DANI ROMERO: Yeah, in an effort to really close this gap when it comes to funding, Trujillo's Latitude Ventures fund actually closed its first institutional fundraising, more than $100 million from really big heavyweights, including JP Morgan, as well as Bank of America. But again, this is just the first step in helping these Latino entrepreneurs. But another thing, too, is that the goal of this fund is to really spark the investment community to give a lending hand to the Latino population, as they really have proven to be a growing population.

SEANA SMITH: Very important story. Dani Romero, thanks so much for bringing that to us.