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Remember: until there's an "event", there are no "returns". Until a buyout or an acquisition happens, there's no money made except on paper.
by JonFish85 11y ago
Remember: until there's an "event", there are no "returns". Until a buyout or an acquisition happens, there's no money made except on paper.
- beambot 11y agoAnd after a liquidity event, the money is really just a bunch of electrons in a computer or magnetic domains on a disk somewhere...
- davnicwil 11y agoNot sure why this is downvoted, it's a very interesting point. Equity in a privately-held company has value in precisely the same abstract sense that money has value. Both are tokens of, and therefore exchangeable for, real work. Why else do people take equity as part of compensation? I think what beambot is getting at here is the value of 'what you own' doesn't become any more or less real after you trade equity for money in a liquidity event. It's fundamentally just as abstract as it ever was, or will be.
- beambot 11y agoSpot on. The only differences are risk, liquidity, and fungibility. But the "money" aspect is fairly abstract up until you're actually trying to spend/exchange it.
- austenallred 11y agoSure, but I wouldn't mind holding 7% - dilution of Airbnb, Dropbox, Teespring and Zenefits. You can give that to me on paper.