With Millions in Donations From the Industry, Ramaswamy Backs Ohio Crypto Gamble
Published in partnership with the Center for Media and Democracy
After President Trump went all in on crypto when he returned to office, Vivek Ramaswamy, the front-runner in the GOP primary for governor of Ohio, began betting big on Bitcoin through his asset management startup Strive—with limited success.
Now, crypto industry players are pouring millions into funding his campaign. Why? If he becomes governor, the billionaire has pledged to expand state investments in a crypto reserve (starting with state revolving funds) that could result in hundreds of millions of dollars in state assets ending up in Bitcoin.
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The largest donor to Ramaswamy’s gubernatorial super PAC in 2025 was Ross Stevens, who donated $14 million and is actively involved with Bitcoin and crypto. The second-largest donor was Jeff Yass, who donated $10 million to the PAC. His holdings in Susquehanna International Group include more than $2 billion in Strategy, a publicly traded firm that exclusively invests in Bitcoin, and over $2 billion in Coinbase, a crypto exchange.
In January 2025—while working for President Trump as co-lead of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and before announcing his bid for governor—Ramaswamy publicly applauded newly introduced legislation that would allow Ohio to begin to invest up to 10 percent of the state’s general fund, budget stabilization fund, and prizes trust fund in a Bitcoin or “digital assets” reserve. Pension funds across the country already have some “exposure to cryptocurrencies through public equities such as MicroStrategy and Coinbase, which are part of major stock indices,” according to the Reason Foundation.
As governor of Ohio, Ramaswamy would also have the power to appoint the trustees of state pension funds, who oversee roughly $250 billion in assets in such funds as the Ohio Public Employees Retirement System and the Ohio State Teachers Retirement System. This means that managers of a much broader set of pension funds could ultimately choose to expand the state’s investments in crypto, following a recent trend around the world.
The governor has “great influence” over state funds in Ohio, financial analyst Chris Tobe, a former pension trustee in Kentucky, told the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD). “I fear Ramaswamy, who through Strive is connected to the entire network of high-risk investments including both crypto and private equity, could take the corruption to the next level,” he said, alluding to Ohio’s notorious history of public corruption and political scandal.
Despite enthusiasm for crypto from Ohio’s Republican lawmakers, a few remain skeptical of investing state funds in the currencies. Last fall, the state’s powerful House Speaker Matt Huffman (R-78) told reporters that he thinks “we need to have a long, hard look at [these kinds of risky things] … I’m still scratching my head over cryptocurrency.”
Recent polls show a tight race for governor of Ohio—a state Trump won for the third time in 2024. But in recent weeks, Ramaswamy has fallen behind Democratic candidate Amy Acton, a former state health director, by roughly ten points, despite Trump’s endorsement.
Ramaswamy’s Anti-ESG Firm Bet Big on Bitcoin
In 2022, shortly after the release of his best-selling book Woke, Inc.: Inside Corporate America’s Social Justice Scam, Ramaswamy co-founded Strive in Ohio as an anti–“environmental, social, and governance” (ESG) firm that rejected so-called “woke capitalism.” He stepped down as executive chairman of the company to run in the GOP primary for president in 2023 but retains a 10 percent ownership.
As co-founder of Strive, Ramaswamy, a biotech billionaire, hoped to cash in on the right’s anti-woke crusade against the “Big Three” financial asset managers—BlackRock, Vanguard, and State Street—that collectively manage $20 trillion and, at the time, were all committed to ESG investing, at least on the surface.
When it made its initial public offering (IPO) in February 2023, Strive managed exchange-traded funds (ETFs), or baskets of stocks reflecting various sectors of the markets.
After Trump signaled that his administration intends to make the U.S. the global crypto capital, the opportunistic entrepreneur now running for governor made a pivot toward Bitcoin, raising $750 million from “mystery investors” so that Strive could buy enough of the currency to become a Bitcoin reserve.
Last September, Strive Enterprises merged with Asset Entities to form Strive, Inc. (or ASST on NASDAQ), “the first publicly traded asset management firm to adopt a Bitcoin treasury strategy,” according to its own site.
As of January 22, Ramaswamy owned almost 114 million shares of Strive’s $1.25 billion in outstanding common stock, or about 10 percent. With Strive stock down 96 percent in the three years since its IPO, how much money he may have lost—if any—is incalculable since the actual price he paid for the stock as a co-founder is unknown.
Now that Strive is heavily invested in Bitcoin, ASST’s stock price is linked with the value of the cryptocurrency. As of the end of March, Strive owned 13,628 Bitcoin bought at an average price of $105,850/Bitcoin. With the currency now fluctuating at approximately $66,900/Bitcoin, ASST has seen a decline of more than 37 percent in the value of its currency holdings.
Beyond the IPO, Strive sold $149.3 million in preferred stock (trading under the symbol SATA) in December 2025. But it didn’t use the proceeds from this second stock sale and cash realized from a merger with another firm, Semler Scientific, to expand its existing ETF offerings or for the management of that portfolio. Instead, it used the proceeds from these sales to expand its mission “to the next frontier”—by buying more Bitcoin.
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