Startups are just illiquid investments, like real estate or even like chunks of public-company equity so large that the market can't absorb their sale. Every si

Startups are just illiquid investments, like real estate or even like chunks of public-company equity so large that the market can't absorb their sale. Every single investor who ever existed has talked their own book; i.e. they promote the assets in which they have a stake. This is not a Ponzi scheme, it's a market. And unlike Ponzi schemes, in venture, there is an underlying asset, which is the company that's growing. Growth and profit are two different things. Profit and valuation are two different things. Valuation, or market cap, are based on the expectation of future revenue. With tech companies, these expectations can be very high, and rightly so. Even if they are grounded in human psychology, and subject to projections, distortions and the like.