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> The fundraise also saw participation from AI chip giant Nvidia This is really obvious 'round-tripping' no? Nvidia invests in startups that are going to spend

> The fundraise also saw participation from AI chip giant Nvidia This is really obvious 'round-tripping' no? Nvidia invests in startups that are going to spend a majority of their funds on GPUs, Nvidia's revenue goes up, Nvidia's stock goes up, Nvidia makes more 'investments' in startups who use that investment to continue the cycle?

Havoc 1y ago
Yes, though realistically they’d be buying the GPUs regardless of who the investors and this sort of vertical integration isn’t directly illegal
- novaRom 1y ago
  Yes, except they are monopolist, right? It's basically not optional choice.
  - Havoc 1y ago
    Technically dominating a market by virtue of best product (or only available) is legal too. If you can achieve that without anti competitive behaviour then being a monopolist is fine. Legally anyway Whether this circular thing counts as such behaviour - don’t know but doubt it
jstummbillig 1y ago
To an extend, sure, but not in the "obvious" way you suggest, because that's very illegal. Any arrangement for Nvidia to obviously and directly fund startups to clearly funnel money back through purchases would quickly attract scrutiny from auditors, regulators, and co-investors.
bboygravity 1y ago
Sidenote: Nvidia has been caught round-tripping before, way back. Looking at the valuation I don't get how they would not be round-tripping and otherwise cooking the books a lot right now (not necesarily limited to this case, but more in general). Very strong Y2K bubble vibes.
daveed 1y ago
The magnitudes make it s.t. it doesn't really matter, I think.
bawana 1y ago
No different than investment banks in the US loaning money to ukraine so they can get patriot missiles. This generates two income streams for the US ( interest payments on the debt and money to RTX for the missiles). Trump gets a cut on both of these monies (tax on income). This is why the Us is pro Israel as well. They are a good customer to the military industrial complex. Now if we could only get japan, ASEAN, S.Korea into a conflict w China over taiwan we could ramp up this model - but we’ll need to build drone factories to usurp the the cheap turkish, polish, ukrainian, and russian suppliers. And the additional bonus is that all this has to be transacted in dollars giving our currency preeminence so we can print more of them and not suffer inflation- even tho there are more dollars chasing the same goods- its happening symmetrically around the world because everyone has to use them.
- xrd 1y ago
  I've been worried about the US abandoning Japan and this radically shifting the power centers in the world. But, the way you describe it sounds like I should not worry. At least, as long as I trust the weapons manufacturers to keep things stable so they can extract their new profit opportunities. I still feel a tinge of worry.

Havoc 1y ago

Yes, though realistically they’d be buying the GPUs regardless of who the investors and this sort of vertical integration isn’t directly illegal

novaRom 1y ago
Yes, except they are monopolist, right? It's basically not optional choice.
- Havoc 1y ago
  Technically dominating a market by virtue of best product (or only available) is legal too. If you can achieve that without anti competitive behaviour then being a monopolist is fine. Legally anyway Whether this circular thing counts as such behaviour - don’t know but doubt it

jstummbillig 1y ago

To an extend, sure, but not in the "obvious" way you suggest, because that's very illegal. Any arrangement for Nvidia to obviously and directly fund startups to clearly funnel money back through purchases would quickly attract scrutiny from auditors, regulators, and co-investors.

bboygravity 1y ago

Sidenote: Nvidia has been caught round-tripping before, way back. Looking at the valuation I don't get how they would not be round-tripping and otherwise cooking the books a lot right now (not necesarily limited to this case, but more in general). Very strong Y2K bubble vibes.

daveed 1y ago

The magnitudes make it s.t. it doesn't really matter, I think.

bawana 1y ago

No different than investment banks in the US loaning money to ukraine so they can get patriot missiles. This generates two income streams for the US ( interest payments on the debt and money to RTX for the missiles). Trump gets a cut on both of these monies (tax on income). This is why the Us is pro Israel as well. They are a good customer to the military industrial complex. Now if we could only get japan, ASEAN, S.Korea into a conflict w China over taiwan we could ramp up this model - but we’ll need to build drone factories to usurp the the cheap turkish, polish, ukrainian, and russian suppliers. And the additional bonus is that all this has to be transacted in dollars giving our currency preeminence so we can print more of them and not suffer inflation- even tho there are more dollars chasing the same goods- its happening symmetrically around the world because everyone has to use them.

xrd 1y ago
I've been worried about the US abandoning Japan and this radically shifting the power centers in the world. But, the way you describe it sounds like I should not worry. At least, as long as I trust the weapons manufacturers to keep things stable so they can extract their new profit opportunities. I still feel a tinge of worry.