V.C.s have spent years dismissing speculation about a private-equity bubble as merely an expression, by know-nothing spectators, of resentment and alarmism; media onlookers, they argue, should talk instead about the triumphal progress of the genuinely great start-ups as they try to solve our most difficult problems. Over the past year, however, as allegations of mismanagement and unsustainability have grown — Square went public for approximately half its last private valuation; Fidelity and other large mutual funds wrote down their positions in Dropbox, MongoDB, and Snapchat; and both Zenefits and Theranos were accused of deceptive practices — that confidence has come to look more like hubris.
One of the things people have been noting about Theranos is that it hardly got any VC money. Bad reporter at the NYT, bad reporter.
Square is an interesting case too. A fair bit of VC money went in at the start. Round D of funding, in 2012, valued the company at $3.25bn. Round E funding, in late 2014, valued the company at $6bn. A year later, the IPO valued it at around $3bn again.
So who lost big in round E? Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund.
The earlier round VCs still made out like capitalist pigs, obviously.
Tim
Have you seen the latest TRUK post – aside from being functionally illiterate – check out these….
‘In other woirds (sic.), from whichever side of the debate you come, and from both (as I do) then the result of tackling tax havens is an increase in well-being for everyone in the world. I am unambiguous: I am sure that this is true. It is just about impossible for it to be otherwise and tax havens have no way on earth they can counter the argumen(sic)’
I, the Lord Murphy, have spoken and will brook no dissension thus….
In this twofold attack, one on the democratic right of governemtns (sic)to tax as they will in accordance with the mandate that they have, and the other on the right of markets to operate in the best interests of society tax havens pose a threat to the two pillars on which werstern (sic)society has been built. The charge sheet cannot be more serious than that.’
Kim Jong Un, Alexander Lukashenka, Bob Mugabe – rest assured, the TJN will respect your ‘democratic mandate’….
He really need to be bumped off for the good of humanity – what an absolute imbecile……