It was founded in San Francisco[5] in 2002 by Peter Thiel, co-founder of PayPal and early investor in Facebook.

[6][1] Its assets under management grew to $8 billion in 2008, after which a series of unprofitable investments and client redemptions shrank that to about $350 million as of 2011.

[7] Clarium was an employee-owned firm that invests in public equity (primarily in micro-cap companies), fixed income, and hedging markets.

[10] Clarium's 2002 performance, a series of correct bets in the energy markets that global demand would cause an oil shortage, was described by a 2009 Wall Street Journal article as "impressive".

[15] It lost most of its value in 2008 on large bets that the US dollar would fall, and AUM reached $681 million in December 2010.