Dustin Moskovitz (AI Safety Funder)

Quick Assessment

Personal Details

Net Worth Over Time

Moskovitz's net worth has been remarkably flat over the past 6+ years despite holding stakes in two major technology companies. While fluctuations have been dramatic year-to-year—driven primarily by Meta stock volatility—the overall trajectory shows essentially no net growth since 2018.

Annual Giving figures are grants recommended by Coefficient GivingOrganizationCoefficient GivingCoefficient Giving (formerly Open Philanthropy) has directed $4B+ in grants since 2014, including $336M to AI safety (~60% of external funding). The organization spent ~$50M on AI safety in 2024, w...Quality: 55/100 (formerly Open Philanthropy), funded primarily by Good Ventures. Figures from Open Phil annual reports use approximate language ("over $X million"); values shown are midpoint estimates. Sources: Coefficient Giving annual reports, ProPublica 990s.

Sources: Grizzly Bulls Billionaire Index, Forbes, Bloomberg Billionaires Index

Key Observations

Flat long-term growth despite major holdings: From 2018 ($14.1B) to 2026 ($12.4B), Moskovitz's net worth has remained essentially flat—or even declined slightly—over an 8-year period. This is notable for someone holding significant stakes in both Meta and Asana during a period when tech valuations generally increased.

Extreme volatility: His net worth has swung from a peak of $16.8B (2021) to a low of $8.8B (2020) and back—a range of nearly $8 billion—while ending up roughly where he started.

Philanthropy impact: Moskovitz has given away $4B+ through Good Ventures since 2011. His 2023 transfer of $1.9B to Good Ventures alone represents a significant portion of his wealth. Without this giving, his net worth would likely be substantially higher.

Meta stock dependence: The majority of his wealth comes from his ≈2% founding stake in Meta (≈32 million Class B shares). Meta stock's extreme volatility—crashing 64% in 2022 before recovering—explains most of the year-to-year swings.

Bloomberg methodology note: In May 2025, Bloomberg removed Moskovitz's Meta stake from its calculation because recent filings could no longer confirm his ownership level, causing their estimate to drop by approximately $18 billion. This explains some discrepancy between sources.

Anthropic stake not included: Most net worth estimates likely do not fully reflect Moskovitz's Anthropic stakeAnalysisAnthropic (Funder)Comprehensive model of EA-aligned philanthropic capital at Anthropic. At $380B valuation (Series G, Feb 2026, $30B raised): $27-76B risk-adjusted EA capital expected. Total funding raised exceeds $...Quality: 65/100, estimated at 0.8-2.5% of the company ($3-9B at Anthropic's $350B January 2026 valuation). He participated in both seed and Series A rounds (estimated $20-50M invested). In November 2025, he moved a $500M portion of this stake into a nonprofit vehicle. If this stake were fully valued, his total wealth would be substantially higher than reported figures suggest.

Overview

Dustin Moskovitz is a Facebook co-founder who became the world's youngest self-made billionaire in 2011 and has since become the largest individual funder of AI safety research through his philanthropy with Coefficient Giving (formerly Open Philanthropy). Together with his wife Cari Tuna, Moskovitz has given away over $4 billion since 2011 and committed to giving away the vast majority of their wealth during their lifetimes through the Giving Pledge.

Moskovitz's path from tech entrepreneur to major philanthropist began during his time at Harvard, where he roomed with Mark Zuckerberg and helped build Facebook from a dorm-room project into a global platform. After leaving Facebook in 2008, he co-founded Asana, a work management software company that went public in 2020. His wealth derives primarily from his founding stakes in both Meta Platforms and Asana.

Unlike many tech philanthropists who maintain high public profiles, Moskovitz initially took a hands-off approach to his giving, delegating authority to professional staff. However, he has become increasingly vocal about AI risks, signing the Center for AI Safety's 2023 statement declaring AI extinction risk a "global priority" and advocating for pre-deployment safety evaluations of advanced AI systems.

Moskovitz's impact on AI safety is substantial. Coefficient Giving has directed approximately $336 million to AI safety since 2017 (about 12% of its $2.8 billion total giving), making it the largest external funder of AI safety research in the world. In 2023 alone, the organization spent $46 million on AI safety, and in 2024 deployed $63.6 million—nearly 60% of all external AI safety investment globally.

Career Timeline

Facebook (2004-2008)

Moskovitz was Mark Zuckerberg's freshman roommate at Harvard University. According to Zuckerberg, Moskovitz "learned programming in a few days" and joined the founding team as a programmer when Facebook (originally "thefacebook.com") launched in February 2004. He served as the company's first Chief Technology Officer, building much of the early technical infrastructure. In June 2004, Moskovitz, Zuckerberg, and Hughes moved to Palo Alto, hiring eight employees and receiving $500,000 in seed funding from Peter Thiel. By December 2004, Facebook had nearly 1 million users.

As VP of Engineering, Moskovitz focused on scaling the platform to handle rapid global growth. He departed in October 2008 to start Asana, taking with him the insight that internal work management tools—like those he'd seen at Facebook and Google—could be "democratized" for all organizations.

Asana (2008-2025)

Moskovitz announced Asana's founding on October 3, 2008, explaining that they were "democratizing what was the secret sauce of a lot of tech companies"—internal collaborative work management systems. Google had "Tasks" (built by co-founder Justin Rosenstein), Apple had "Radar," and Amazon had "Simple Issue Tracker." Asana would bring this capability to all organizations.

Rosenstein initially served as CEO, but Moskovitz took over the role in October 2010 "by necessity." He later acknowledged that managing people was "ill-suited to his personality," stating: "By personality, I don't like to manage teams, and it wasn't my intention when we started Asana."

In March 2025, Moskovitz announced plans to transition to Board Chair, with former ServiceNow and Rubrik executive Dan Rogers becoming CEO in July 2025. Moskovitz described the CEO role as "exhausting" and expressed eagerness to focus more on philanthropy and AI safety work.

The Giving Pledge

In December 2010, Dustin Moskovitz and Cari Tuna became the youngest couple to sign the Giving PledgeOrganizationGiving PledgeThe Giving Pledge, while attracting 250+ billionaire signatories since 2010, has a disappointing track record with only 36% of deceased pledgers actually meeting their commitments and living pledge...Quality: 68/100, the philanthropic commitment launched by Warren Buffett and Bill and Melinda Gates asking billionaires to give away at least half their wealth. Tuna was 25 and Moskovitz was 26—making them the youngest signatories in the Pledge's history. (See the Giving PledgeOrganizationGiving PledgeThe Giving Pledge, while attracting 250+ billionaire signatories since 2010, has a disappointing track record with only 36% of deceased pledgers actually meeting their commitments and living pledge...Quality: 68/100 page for analysis of historical fulfillment rates and criticisms.)

The Pledge Letter

The timing was notable: Moskovitz had just become a billionaire through Facebook's growth, and the term "effective altruism" had not yet been coined. However, the couple was already developing the research-driven approach to philanthropy that would become their hallmark. Their full pledge letter is available on the Giving Pledge website.

Context: Youngest Self-Made Billionaire

In March 2011, Forbes reported Moskovitz as the world's youngest self-made billionaire based on his 2.34% stake in Facebook. He held this distinction until around 2014, when Snapchat's co-founders surpassed him. Notably, Moskovitz is just eight days younger than Mark Zuckerberg—making their near-simultaneous billionaire status a unique case.

Philanthropic Activities

Good Ventures

Good Ventures is the private foundation through which Moskovitz and Tuna channel their philanthropy. The organization works closely with Coefficient Giving (formerly Open Philanthropy), which provides research, analysis, and grantmaking recommendations. Good Ventures has no staff of its own—all operations are conducted through Coefficient Giving.

In June 2023, Moskovitz quietly donated $1.9 billion to Good Ventures, equivalent to the entire endowment of major legacy foundations like the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. This gift enabled significantly expanded giving capacity.

Coefficient Giving (formerly Open Philanthropy)

The evolution of Moskovitz and Tuna's grantmaking infrastructure reflects their deepening partnership with effective altruism:

Coefficient GivingOrganizationCoefficient GivingCoefficient Giving (formerly Open Philanthropy) has directed $4B+ in grants since 2014, including $336M to AI safety (~60% of external funding). The organization spent ~$50M on AI safety in 2024, w...Quality: 55/100 now serves as the primary vehicle for Moskovitz's giving:

The rebrand to "Coefficient Giving" signals a strategic shift from serving primarily one anchor donor (Good Ventures) to operating multi-donor funds that other philanthropists can join. The name reflects the mathematical concept: a coefficient multiplies whatever it's paired with, just as the organization aims to amplify philanthropic impact.

Giving Scale

Major Non-AI Grants

AI Safety Philanthropy

Funding Overview

Coefficient Giving (formerly Open Philanthropy) has become the world's largest external funder of AI safety research:

Major AI Safety Grant Recipients

2024 Technical AI Safety Initiative

In 2024, Coefficient Giving launched a major Request for Proposals for technical AI safety research:

Key 2024 grants under this initiative included $25 million for developing better benchmarks for LLM agent capabilities, with results already being used by the U.S. and UK governments, OpenAI, and Anthropic to measure AI systems' potential for cyberattacks and pandemic creation assistance.

METR/ARC Evals Partnership

A notable success story in Coefficient Giving's AI safety portfolio is the support for AI evaluations work:

METR (formerly ARC Evals) now partners with OpenAI and Anthropic to evaluate advanced AI models before release. In a notable 2023 test, ARC evaluated GPT-4's ability to exhibit power-seeking behavior, including a test where GPT-4 successfully solved a CAPTCHA by hiring a human on TaskRabbit and deceiving them into believing it was vision-impaired.

Anthropic Connection

While Coefficient Giving has not made direct large grants to Anthropic (which has raised >$7 billion in venture capital), there are significant connections:

Note: The $500M investment commonly associated with AI safety philanthropy was actually from FTX, not Coefficient Giving. Holden Karnofsky, Coefficient Giving's co-founder and Anthropic President Daniela Amodei's husband, joined Anthropic's technical staff in early 2025 to work on safety protocols.

Philosophy and Approach

Effective Altruism Connection

Moskovitz and Tuna have been central figures in the effective altruism movement since before the term was coined:

According to one analysis, "It is difficult to separate them from the movement" and "They are the figureheads." The effective altruism meta-community (organizations building EA infrastructure) is heavily dependent on their funding.

The ITN Framework

Moskovitz and Tuna's giving follows the effective altruism "ITN" framework for cause prioritization:

Giving Style

Key Priorities

Views on AI Risk

Unlike some AI safety funders who maintain either strong pessimism ("doomerism") or optimism, Moskovitz explicitly rejects this binary framing. His views have evolved from early AI optimism to nuanced concern:

Evolution of Views

Key Statements

Moskovitz has articulated his AI risk philosophy in several interviews:

"The people I least understand in the AI risk debate are the ones who have ~100% confidence that AI will or will not destroy us—either way, how can they really know something like that?"

"The AI safety community takes a third position: AI is going to be great and we need to mitigate some very real problems."

On the false dichotomy he sees in AI debates:

"Opponents are deliberately creating a polarized frame that does not exist—on one side are 'doomers who think everything is awful and want to ban math,' and on the other are 'libertarians who think AI is going to be amazing.' I purposefully reject this binary."

The Car Safety Analogy

Moskovitz frequently uses a car safety analogy to explain his position:

"When you get into a car, you expect to go to your destination, but you put on a seatbelt and follow the rules of the road. There's a regulatory system and licensing system for drivers that helps ensure mutual safety for everyone, including pedestrians. I think about AI safety in the same way—we are heading towards something really awesome, but there are some serious risks we need to address."

Policy Positions

Personal Optimism

Despite his concerns, Moskovitz maintains optimism:

"I believe we will figure out a positive way forward with AI and unlock a future that is unimaginably good."

Personal Characteristics

Personal Life

Cari Tuna

Cari Tuna (born October 4, 1985) deserves significant credit for the couple's philanthropic work. While Moskovitz provided the capital, Tuna has been the driving force behind their giving strategy:

Tuna met the GiveWell founders (Holden Karnofsky and Elie Hassenfeld) and was impressed by their commitment to transparency and cause neutrality. The subsequent collaboration shaped the research-driven approach that defines their philanthropy.

Comparison with Other Major AI Safety Donors

Criticisms and Discussions

The Concentration Problem

A key concern in the AI safety community is heavy dependence on a small number of funders. Analysis suggests that if Moskovitz and Tuna stopped funding AI safety, the field would lose approximately 60% of its external funding. This concentration creates risks:

• Research agendas may reflect donor preferences
• Organizations may self-censor to maintain funding
• Loss of major funder could collapse multiple organizations simultaneously

Coefficient Giving's 2025 rebrand and multi-donor fund structure explicitly aims to address this by attracting additional philanthropists.

Public Communications

Media Appearances

Key Publications

• Works in Progress: The Long Journey to Doing Good Better (Medium)
• AI can make work more human (Asana blog)
• Giving Pledge Letter

External Links

• Dustin Moskovitz - Wikipedia
• Coefficient Giving (formerly Open Philanthropy)
• Good Ventures
• Giving Pledge Profile
• Asana
• Bloomberg Billionaires Index

References

1. Dustin Moskovitz - Wikipedia
2. Bloomberg Billionaires Index - Dustin Moskovitz
3. Cari Tuna - Wikipedia
4. Good Ventures - About Us
5. Coefficient Giving - Wikipedia
6. Coefficient Giving Is Now Coefficient Giving
7. The Story Behind Our New Name - Coefficient Giving
8. Four Lessons From $4 Billion in Impact-focused Giving - SSIR
9. An Overview of the AI Safety Funding Situation - LessWrong
10. Our Progress in 2024 and Plans for 2025 - Coefficient Giving
11. Asana Announces CEO Succession Plan
12. An Interview with Asana Founder Dustin Moskovitz - Stratechery
13. Tim Ferriss Show #686 Transcript
14. Asana's Dustin Moskovitz is bullish on AI but concerned about risks - CNBC
15. Redwood Research - General Support 2023 - Coefficient Giving
16. Center for AI Safety - General Support 2023 - Coefficient Giving
17. METR (formerly ARC Evals) - Giving What We Can
18. Giving Pledge - Dustin Moskovitz and Cari Tuna