This is both a financial ("will this investment make money?") and a signaling ("what does (not)owning Snap say about us?") decision. They say "quietly" because

This is both a financial ("will this investment make money?") and a signaling ("what does (not)owning Snap say about us?") decision. They say "quietly" because NBCU didn't publicize this at all, suggesting that they liked the signal of buying Snap, but no longer like the financial investment. You could compare this to Sequoia walking away Finix two days ago[1], where Sequoia wanted to be very loud and squash the financial signal by letting Finix keep the money. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22527943 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22527943