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In general I am shocked whenever a single anecdote like this is reported as the truth. They try to add some cachet by saying they looked at 1,300 firms, but pic

In general I am shocked whenever a single anecdote like this is reported as the truth. They try to add some cachet by saying they looked at 1,300 firms, but picking only one start date is awful. I'd be really interested in average 10 year returns on VC from the past 10 years. I.e funds raised from 1990 to 2000. Obviously even more interesting will be how the current funds do.

dgabriel 16y ago
The 15 and 20 year returns are stunning.
- secretasiandan 16y ago
  The 15 year ago vintage class does have amazing returns. However, assume for a second we can take different vintage years and say that return(t-20 to t-0) = return(t-20 to t-15)*return(t-15 to t-0). Then all the money was made from t-15 to t-10 since the t-10 vintage class has basically zero returns and the t-20 returns are approximately the t-15 returns annualized over 20 years instead of 15
borism 16y ago
there are 15 and 20 year columns in the table under that post
secretasiandan 16y ago
6th paragraph "The median net return to VC fund investors has not been positive for any vintage year since 1998." I'm curious, did you read the article and miss all the talk about vintage years? Or did you only skim it? Or did you only read the comment? Or did I misinterpret your comment?
- meterplech 16y ago
  I may not have known what the terms meant, but I took that to mean 10 year returns on funds. So, I thought it was only referring to funds started in 1998, 1999, and 2000. Still definitely not a overwhelming amount of data. I forgot to mention the other years in my comment. However, the general idea of the comment still holds- they took an exact bit of data, like 10 year returns for the worst years of funds to determine that VCs aren't valuable. As has already been commented, if you looked at the 15 or 20 year returns you will be amazed in the other direction.

dgabriel 16y ago

The 15 and 20 year returns are stunning.

secretasiandan 16y ago
The 15 year ago vintage class does have amazing returns. However, assume for a second we can take different vintage years and say that return(t-20 to t-0) = return(t-20 to t-15)*return(t-15 to t-0). Then all the money was made from t-15 to t-10 since the t-10 vintage class has basically zero returns and the t-20 returns are approximately the t-15 returns annualized over 20 years instead of 15

borism 16y ago

there are 15 and 20 year columns in the table under that post

secretasiandan 16y ago

6th paragraph "The median net return to VC fund investors has not been positive for any vintage year since 1998." I'm curious, did you read the article and miss all the talk about vintage years? Or did you only skim it? Or did you only read the comment? Or did I misinterpret your comment?

meterplech 16y ago
I may not have known what the terms meant, but I took that to mean 10 year returns on funds. So, I thought it was only referring to funds started in 1998, 1999, and 2000. Still definitely not a overwhelming amount of data. I forgot to mention the other years in my comment. However, the general idea of the comment still holds- they took an exact bit of data, like 10 year returns for the worst years of funds to determine that VCs aren't valuable. As has already been commented, if you looked at the 15 or 20 year returns you will be amazed in the other direction.