2 approaches: 1) you pay the strike, and pray the valuation continues to rise through any IPO, buyout, etc.. 2) arbitrage - you pay the low strike, then sell

2 approaches: 1) you pay the strike, and pray the valuation continues to rise through any IPO, buyout, etc.. 2) arbitrage - you pay the low strike, then sell in the secondary market for more, and hopefully realize a one-time profit after cost frictions. From the article, sounds like most of the afflicted here were playing strategy (1), while there was some window to execute on (2) though many may have not noticed it.