The first paragraph is misleading enough that I stopped reading; there's no evidence that Thiel has NZ citizenship "as a hedge against the looming apocalypse" (?), and he recently sold that "500 acre estate".

He was given citizenship by a conservative-leaning Prime Minister in the hopes that he would invest in the local tech scene, which he has. The $50 million he invested is not a lot by silicon valley standards but it is a fair amount for New Zealand, and it went to some of NZ's best startups (possible bias, I worked at one).