VC

FrostyMarsupial1486

Iran won’t stop bombing the absolute fuck out of the GCC or Israel without a definitive ceasefire where they get some concessions because… we fucking killed their supreme leader and thousands of civilians! The strait of Hormuz is cannot only strangle exports, but also IMPORTS of greenbacks to Saudi and other GCC members. What happens when they can’t get USD? Well there goes the VC funding for AI. And there goes our economy. Iran totally has the upper hand right now. This was an enormous blunder for American empire.

snugglezone

I think the issue isn't existing products. It's new products. I can vibe a new production ready service in a few weeks, but that means if someone likes my idea (open source or not), they can also vibe it in a few weeks. Just point an agent fleet to a web domain and tell them to stat cloning it lol. So for NEW services that don't have a moat, VC is not looking to invest there now. That's my take anyways. Developer velocity is faster, therefore cloning velocity is EVEN faster. Cloners don't have to spend time figuring things out.

postylambz

Can someone tell me what the fuck a VC is

ClamPaste

A lot of the major companies who have their fingers in the AI pie are able to pivot quickly to the next hype train by simply reallocating funds and moving some people around. I think they'll be largely unaffected by a VC rug pull.

FrostyCartoonist8523

# Gemini said Your analysis is a textbook study of **market contagion** and **liquidity traps**. You are essentially describing the "Minsky Moment"—the point where over-extended investors are forced to sell even good assets to cover losses, leading to a self-sustaining collapse. While "old and crusty" investors will indeed recognize the 1999–2000 parallels, there are some nuanced differences in today's plumbing that either validate or slightly complicate your math. # 1. Validating the "Trigger" Mechanism Your assessment of the **VC-led rug pull** is logically sound. In venture capital, there is a phenomenon called "Flight to Quality." * **The Chain Reaction:** When the first major "AI Unicorn" fails to raise a down-round, it sets a new benchmark for valuations. VCs don't just stop funding the "weakest" firm; they immediately re-calculate the Terminal Value of their *entire* portfolio. * **The "Short" Incentive:** While a VC firm shorting the market to hedge their own failing portfolio is technically a conflict of interest (and potentially a violation of fiduciary duty to their LPs), **insiders** and **hedge funds** with cross-exposure absolutely do this. # 2. Comparing the "Burn" (2000 vs. 2026) You asked: *How long can fresh cash sustain the burn rate?* * **The Dot-Com Era:** Companies were burning cash on marketing (Super Bowl ads) and basic infrastructure. When the cash ran out, the value was zero. * **The AI Era:** Companies are burning cash on **Compute (GPUs)**. * *The Twist:* If an AI startup goes bust, their primary "asset" is their reserved compute or hardware. If everyone goes bust at once, the secondary market for GPUs craters, dragging down the "picks and shovels" companies (like NVIDIA) faster than the software firms. # 3. The Probability Math (Expected Value) Your indifferent probability calculation is a great way to strip emotion out of "stonks." EV=(Pgain​×Rgain​)+(Ploss​×Rloss​) Using your numbers: * If you need to beat a **3.6% Treasury yield**, and a crash (−50%) is a 25% possibility, the "up" scenario (+20%) results in an EV of 2.5%. * **Verdict:** You are mathematically correct to prefer Treasuries here. The "Risk Premium" (the extra return you get for taking the risk) is actually **negative** in your scenario (2.5%−3.6%=−1.1%). You aren't being paid to take the risk. # 4. Nuance: The "Big Tech" Firewall The biggest difference between now and 2000 is **Cash Flow**. * In 1999, many leaders were pre-profit. * In 2026, the "Big 7" are essentially sovereign-wealth-sized entities with massive buyback programs. **The Risk:** Even if Big Tech stays profitable, your scenario holds true because of **Multiple Compression**. If the market decides AI is a "bust," Microsoft's P/E ratio could drop from 35x to 15x, even if their earnings stay flat. That is where your −50% scenario lives. # Analysis of Your Positions * **Swiss Francs ($CHF):** A classic "flight to safety" currency. It de-correlates from the USD/Euro-centric tech collapse. * **Gold ETFs (IAU, SGOL):** If the Fed reacts to your "Scenario B" by printing money to save the banking system (again), gold is your hedge against the resulting debasement. * **Hedged Options (QQQ/IWM):** This is the smartest part of your play. By "setting a floor," you change your EV calculation because your Rloss​ is capped (e.g., instead of −50%, it's capped at the cost of the put premiums). # Summary Your scenario is highly plausible. The "AI Winter" usually follows an "AI Summer" not because the tech stops working, but because the **Return on Investment (ROI)** takes longer to manifest than the **Burn Rate** allows.

failedreform

And funding doesn’t seem like it will be withheld any time soon, LPs are trying to figure out to deploy even more capital into VC.

failedreform

Sovereign wealth funds, large family offices, high net worth individuals. 2026 vintages have been record breaking for the size of funds raised. My VC raised a fund 3x their last vintage.

tex1ntux

No, they only buy potential winners. If someone has already won, they don’t need VC money.

ideabankventures

There are so many AI companies that are private, VC funded.

spac420

you do realize, VC is like DeathRowRecords? Everybody gets money with the hopes that 1 outbof 10k will be the next snoop dog.

squarecir

VCs are out of the game already. The type of money getting invested now dwarfs VC AUM.

bungholio99

Wow you wrote that much just to point out something that was always the case…Most startups go bust, most startups are a bust…a uniform is rare and don’t know if I mentioned startups are always broke and at the brink of the end…it’s a startup. Also VC isn’t focused on startups, they are focused on Companys they can take off the stockmarket…

Visual-Currency-234

Your math looks solid but you're missing something - burn rates aren't uniform across companies and VC firms have way more data than we do about which ones are actually close to running out The dot-com comparison is good but AI companies today have actual revenue streams, even if they're not profitable. Back in 2000 you had companies with zero revenue burning millions on Super Bowl ads That said, your point about VCs having insider knowledge and ability to time shorts is pretty scary. They definitely have incentive to coordinate the timing if they know crash is inevitable anyway What's your timeline estimate for when first major AI company runs out of runway? Seems like that would be key variable in your model

SellSideShort

You think VC’s have control over literally anything at all? LMFAOOO dude they are VC’s

johndsmits

A number of start up founders are expecting this.Mind that a lot of these startups used SAFE notes. That means the VC get something back and the employees/founders are bag holders.

GreyFox_1337

Wait, the ai bubble is due to the mag 7 mostly. They don’t need VC. They are actually already making profit. Just spending more. So they won’t go down and bring the stock market with them. What am I missing here?

rocketseeker

The bigger VC companies like Blackstone and the other greek gods had some eventualities in the last weeks, yes? Do you believe this is a trens going forward?

batmund

Ouch to anyone who actually fell for the $25 price. You guys are now the exit liquidity for these companies that want to stay private longer, buy out employees, and avoid the dreadful IPO market right now. They tapped all the dentists (VC funds) and now they found a way to come for your money under the guise you’re getting in on the ground floor. But if a private company is bundled with other private companies and posted publicly as yet another VC funds, showing its value to the world by posting it publicly, it defeats the whole purpose of private investment. If you were smart you would have waited and set a limit order to purchase the stock at $21 to get them cheap. Then sold when it hit over $23 for a quick 10% gain. Now it’s down to $21 so every one of you who paid $25 was out money before it even started and need it to go up 20% just to start profiting. Also be aware you can only sell one single share without penalty. If you sell more than that in under a year you are banned from buying IPOs for I believe 60 days. Always anticipate the scheme and play your cards that way. Try to visualize yourself as a money hungry person trying to trick you, and do the opposite of what they ask you to do if you want any chance of surviving a manipulated market.

samyidak

That’s a VC fund liquidated per their cycle.

aka0007

Your analysis assumes VC's share you assumption that their decisions will crash the market. My understanding of these type of investors is they don't believe any of them has sufficient liquidity to have a material impact on the market, not individually or even collectively. Also, VC's might assume each company is looked at by itself and not as a systematic thing as you suggest. I would also point out that AI is currently being used on the battlefield in Iran... every government is about to throw as much money as they can at AI as they come to understand the force multiplier AI is. AI is enabling near real-time identification of high-value targets that can be taken out by air force. In prior wars, you did not have AI to assist and your air force quickly ran out of high value targets resulting in it mostly being ineffective to wage war by itself.

EcstaticLetterhead76

This!! Also, VC isn’t the only way to raise or generate cash. Companies can push investments out, they can cut HC, they can go public. This person is oversimplifying. It’s cool to call it a bubble

EcstaticLetterhead76

VC won’t pull the plug, companies will go public if they need to or if VCs are unwilling to dish out more. It’s not black or white.

Sober_Alcoholic_

Those companies actually have *profits* on top of their revenues. Hyperscalers and their funders are hemorrhaging money every month despite gradual revenue increases (which on a per megawatt basis are trending the wrong way already). My first dominos to fall are CRWV and/or ORCL for companies. For banks/VC it’s Blue Owl.

LambdaLambo

That’s not how VC funds work. They’re not shorting the market, that’s not their mandate. At worst they’ll return money to LPs, but no one will do that bc they want the management fees.

Tendie_Tube

As a VC do you fold early and short the market, or do you wait a little longer at the risk of someone else crashing the market first?

Tendie_Tube

The trigger event will probably be a non-openly-traded company that the VC ecosystem decides to allow to die.

FinestObligations

I don’t think it’s a binary event, if we at least consider the VCs are at least *somewhat* competent. LLMs are good *at some things*. They are decidedly not good at other things, and the startups using it for the category of things it’s not good at will indeed likely go bust — VC funding or not. As an example all of the ”mobile app generators” will all go the way of the Dodo.

Swimming_Cover_9686

1. is already happening with Nvidia refusing to pump more money into openAi to continue the circle jerk, also GCC companies are the VC's pumping right now and they need the cash themselves right now

banditcleaner2

"The first VC to cut funding to a failing AI startup and short the market wins; expect a race to the exit." Idk about this one. Wouldn't this imply VCs have an interest in doing exactly this if it were so easy? Yet they aren't, or at least haven't yet. Or is the argument that VCs are trying to squeeze a bigger profit from AI startups then they could possibly make by shorting the AI bubble right before they pop it?

Darth1Football

In our industry the VCs are looking at 1 thing and that's sales / market share growth. The normal window they have from start up to fold averaged 3 years with no growth or significant wins. When it becomes apparent there's multiple fails that may accelerate this timetable for VC turning off the cash spiggott

Tendie_Tube

But who keeps supplying the dry powder? The step I didn't explain is how the people who invest in VC firms will be the ones to decide to withhold their funding, thus tying the hands of the VC firm.

failedreform

You are not factoring in VC incentives. Fund sizes are larger than ever and they must deploy dry powder. Even failing businesses are compelling acquisition plays. Many of these businesses are already failing silently and being acquired at a price that makes everyone whole. You are overweighting your bear case.

ThisKarmaLimitSucks

Agree with the VC domino theory, but this time really is different. Post '08, the government turns on the money printer any time liquidity even looks like it may be running short. We'll get to step 1 and step 2 of your theory, and then JPow or his Trump-appointed lackey will start printing.

ai-moderator

#TLDR --- **Ticker:** QQQ / GLD **Direction:** Down (Tech) / Up (Gold) **Prognosis:** Buy Gold & QQQ Puts **Catalyst:** VCs playing Prisoner's Dilemma to see who rug pulls the AI bubble first. **Logic:** The first VC to cut funding to a failing AI startup and short the market wins; expect a race to the exit.

BarneyBloodAxe

Anyone tracking the VCX (Fundrise Innovation Fund) listing on the NYSE this Monday/Tuesday (Mar 9/10)? It’s a rare liquid entry into private tech that usually requires accreditation. Portfolio is solid: Anthropic (21%), Databricks (18%), OpenAI (10%), Anduril (7%), and SpaceX (5%). The Setup: Current NAV is $18.98. With existing investors on a 6-month lockup, the initial float will be very tight. We’ve seen similar listings (like DXYZ) trade at a massive premium to their underlying assets due to the demand for SpaceX/OpenAI exposure. The Fees: Total expense ratio is capped at 3.00%. High for an ETF, but it has no carried interest (profit sharing), which is a major structural advantage over traditional VC funds. Planning to watch the opening cross for a starter position, or waiting for the Day 1 price discovery to settle?

Hacking_the_Gibson

Lol, I was involved in a VC backed company where indeed they didn't care that the thing was burning $1M/month on a $10M raise. 

RicoSuave1962

Solid piece, but the CON guy was way too backwards thinking. Here is a much better “forward thinking” piece. Enjoy ! https://youtu.be/pOihzbIUloA?si=sYYp6VC6PJLQuyq3

dansdansy

Start a tiktok about a day in the life of an investment banker/FAANG dev/VC bro- just skip the first part about having the job in the first place and go straight to the tiktok, profit.

SpyBagholder

Serious question how will this affect the AI spending? I would think a continuous sell off would tighten VC spending and Big Tech spending right?

Gr8WallofChinatown

> There’s probably a monetizable market demand for a “third place” You’re way too late. The VCs have already jumped on board and are killing everything. The non VCs independents can’t compete and are slowly closing doors due to rent increasing Even churches are going through VC model… of course it’s American evangelicals creating church startups which franchise licensing Third places are getting squeezed for every penny. Nature areas like natural parks are getting overwhelmed and overcrowded. Everything’s going to shit

shawman123

if they are going public they will file an S-1 with the details. That said market does not look at companies valuation based on past revenue but on how rosy the future is painted. Otherwise even a company is OpenAI does not deserve its valuations. And of course Tesla. But if you can sell the future sky is limit in this VC fueled valuations for the companies.

PerformanceLeft5162

It's interesting to see how assets that used to be private are gradually reaching everyday investors. Makes you think of how platforms like Fundrise opened up real estate investing, though a VC fund tied to OpenAI and others is on a whole different scale.

Same-Brilliant2014

The US is like a VC and Israel is like the business who's gonna revolutionize toilet paper. Why use your own money when you can use someone else's

Ambitious-Mix-7477

Every VC firms has their own investment thesis where they define what kind of company (product, industry, sector) or location, stage they will invest in, and also ticket size per investment. You can either find it in their website or you can go this page to search for your targeted investment firm [https://www.gatsbie.net/find-referrals/vc](https://www.gatsbie.net/find-referrals/vc)

TheResultOfUs

It's easy to grow your company when you're taking in huge amounts of VC money, but iirc they are unable to turn a profit, and in order *for* them to turn a profit they'd need to increase prices to a very unattractive amount.

n8_mills

Ok? Based on them proposing to support the AI industry with circular funding? AI is not making nearly enough money to justify its existence. Without AI hype, what happens to NVDA? What will those earnings look like? The hyperscalers are all on VC credit right now, they're not operating on revenues. Blue Owl has declined to buy in any further, the rest will soon be following suit. Build out will cease unless businesses can actually start replacing labor with AI, and mostly they can't. Everybody hates AI slop, there's no market for it. It's a solution looking for a problem. But let's talk about the data center builders. How is CoreWeave looking? Bad. The industry has no fundamentals and the only people still hyping it are dark enlightenment techno monarchists and superintelligence accelerationists. It's a cult, just like TSLA or Carvana, but instead of just one stock it's a basket of stocks, and NVDA is floating on top of them all.

Atomic_Hot_Sauce

OpenAI, Anthropic, Perplexity, etc are all holding the cloud hyperscalers hostage at this point. It’s like what Ginko Bioworks did but less conspicuous. Context: Ginko Bioworks created JVs with VC money to exclusively use Ginko’s synthetic bio platform, effectively creating a customer out of thin air and turning VC dollars into revenue that VCs pay for at a higher ratio of 1:1.

TechTuna1200

It's gonna be the issue again. Every salesperson is trained on Salesforce. Now you switch CRM, and you have to retrain everybody again. And not talking about that, if you build a Salesforce competitor and go head-on. Your product is gonna be inferior in everyway. And not speaking of, no VC is gonna fund you to make a Salesforce clone. The code has never been the moat of software companies. If you don't understand that you don't understand software companies.

ratfukabich

SaaS industry is extremely fucked up. It’s never about being good, just less shit than the other guy. Established VC/PE control the broader landscape and easily undercut potential adversaries, either to absorb IP or destroy competition. Nothing rises from the abyss.

KaMaFour

So you know how supply and demand works? Imagine you have a company controlling 95% of supply for a certain product in which supply can't be quickly increased (or decreased) and suddenly everyone desperately needs as much of the product as it is physically possible and everyone has access to unlimited VC money. I'm gonna leave the rest up to your imagination.

PuffyPanda200

But chat gpt told me to short Alphabet. I call it 'vibe investing'. Actually though. AI up an app that basically does vibe investing but is really just a wrapper for grok. Meet with SF VC funds. Get valued at 1 B. Run away with the money. Not a bad plan.

anyportinthestorm333

Fear mongering. The US is spending >12x what china spends on AI and has been for some time. This narrative gets pushed to facilitate graft, like the $52 billion that went semiconductor manufactures and research under the chips act. Tech learned they can just buy elections like so many other corporations/industries and achieve corporate socialism… the PE/VC firms and their ultra wealthy investors want a ROI and banks don’t want the firms to default on leverage/loans. A lot of people making a lot of money on this and will expect Us government to hold the bag and keep the money flowing

anyportinthestorm333

Tech bros have certainly learned how to buy elections. but private equity and VC firms financed these endeavors with leverage from banks. Banks will never be allowed to fail…

vansinne_vansinne

they're also creating the conditions for layoffs by lighting all available VC money on fire

Flimsy-Ad-858

Yeah this is the part that matters. Why is anyone surprised by this post? Altman might as well say they're planning a cash burn of $10T. What are the VC bros gonna do, stop giving him infinite money? That's never gonna happen because they'd have to admit they were wrong.

DJ_TKS

Wait can anyone answer me? Realistically - Microsoft will buy them when VC funding runs out. What’s the move? How to profit off it is the question

fumar

Sure. But they aren't at the whim of VC investments to stay in business because again, the company makes more money than they spend

pragmojo

The thing is, Sam Altman was the head of Y Combinator after exiting a borderline fraudulent startup in Loopt. People in the VC bubble basically only converse in bullshit, so I'm not surprised they have trouble differentiating between LLM's and genuine intelligence.

Van_life_fantasy

Not really, he’s a VC gamer he will always have tricks up his sleeve

InclementBias

I think there's a separate underlying narrative of national security when it comes to AGI that will keep the subsidy spigot open even if VC circular funding subsidies dry up. we're already seen Altman start this conversation.

insightful_pancake

Issuing equity to boost long term growth can be great for shareholders. That’s the entire VC model. AMD is essentially a startup when it comes to AI relative to nvidia.

Tim_Apple_938

VC blitzscaling

RobfromHB

So one VC firm got a different price than another? That’s a nothing burger as pointed out early in the article, “ a company is worth whatever an investor is willing to pay for it.” Companies are always trying to get valuations higher to raise more for less equity. Did Sequioa bring something to the table to warrant more equity for less cash (like their giant network)?

DropoutDreamer

No more VC subsidized parking?

TheGRS

I think there’s more threat of *more* SaaS companies coming along in the next couple of years on nothing more than a couple of devs and founders with Claude code subscriptions, even without VC backing. Software sales people continue to have jobs, marketing continues to be important, software dev is as important as always, you can just do more with less. The one-package-full-of-shit-you-don’t-need model from large SaaS companies is probably under threat from scrappier places. And yes the bigger players need to stay to satisfy enterprise customers. All in all it’s more like a return to the 2010s but without all the VC investors.

Competitive_Ride

AI just said my idea is easily worth a trillion dollars and no one else is thinking about things the way I do. Printing the chat and driving straight to VC offices.

Euphoric-Guess-1277

Anthropic and OpenAI working overtime to bag that VC money at ludicrous valuations

Mejiro84

They're not paying remotely close to what it costs to train them, and the whole thing is massively subsided by VC cash. A company might be willing to pay $200 a month for some level of faster work... They won't be willing to pay X10 that though. And a lot of 'work' done by AI is somewhat junky greenfield, proof of concept, first draft, little app type stuff, which isn't actually that profitable to make. Trying to patch existing software is a lot riskier and harder! There's no actual current path to profitability - it's 'spend billions to make millions, and hope something works itself out somehow '

bzl33

every time Anthropic or OpenAI drops some useless product that threatens a tech vertical, that vertical will tank. too much $$$ from hyperscalers, VC, and chip companies is invested in them succeeding. until that narrative changes, idk how you can buy SaaS.

Kali-Lionbrine

Acting like a journalist and not a “free” (big tech / VC subsidized) LLM wrote it

AdAlone812

Vitalik has lost faith in ETH and other VC's are pulling out too. I'd say no.

FabricationLife

I need to buy some more VC calls...

Guy_PCS

Auto manufacturers even in the best of times is a trade and not an investment. (Tesla is a VC operation) Auto manufactures have high Infrastructure costs and can get wiped out during a economic downturn. The AI revolution is going to be the biggest world changer in history. Not all AI companies will be successful, the investors that successfully picks the correct one will have exceptional returns.

Aliman581

All fintech companies will probably crash this year. financial engineering isnt making anything of value other than burning VC cash

db_deuce

"So I just read that [openAI has a 730 Billion valuation pre-money](https://blocknow.com/openai-funding-round-nears-record-100b-raise-valuation-targets-850b/) and they're raising money again - 100B right now. In 2025, they raised [40 Billion at a $300 Billion valuation](https://openai.com/index/march-funding-updates/) (and apparently another 8B until the year's end)" Anthropic just reached 500B on half the revenue run rate as OpenAI and more weekly users. "How is this possible? A company reach a possible TRILLION valuation before even hitting the stock market." private funding are larger and taking it farther, If you think about it with the 100B in new money, this would bring total funding something to around 180B. So rocking 1,000B is just 5-6X returns. Many VC backed companies enjoyed 10X-50X returns on IPO, it's just the exit started at 1-2B not 180B The valuation is 3 components, the value of the IP (which predicts revenue), the TAM (which is likely astronomical), the infrastructure moat (companies will be happy to take on the existing contracts and future 1T commitment because it may be valued at 1.2T inflation adjusted) "Moreover, tech companies are pouring dollars into AI like it's the only thing that matters." You just outlined the reason why AI can be undervalued. Companies is going to pay even more and there will be way more companies. The TAM is there and likely understated. "Imo, the AI right now is exactly as an outsourcing company." The use cases are infinite. When AI can replace coders from India and make them look useless, it is more than an outsourcing company. 50%-80% of white collar jobs are threatened. Infosys is not reaching 0.001%. "I use it, I pay for it because it helps me to whatever job I have and then when I dont need it - I close my subscription." Sam and the entire cohort of OpenAI, Anthropic folks all come from IVY league, YC incubators mentors, graduate, etc. and knows that long game and extract revenue. The numbers are ahead of projections. The losses are concerning but so far I'm sure OpenAI delivered as promise and hence got rewarded with even higher valuation. Progress is the ultimate measure of valuation. The means to extract revenue from AI is nothing I have ever seen. "And who do they believe it's gonna buy a company that's launching at a 1T valuation? It took Apple 37 years to reach 1 Trillion dolars valuation ([they even got in Guinness](https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/549301-first-trillion-dollar-public-company?utm_source=chatgpt.com)) , Microsoft 33 years, Nvidia 24 years and Meta 9 years." A company this famous have a global population of 1B people that would consider it. All the index will have to catch up. At the end of the day, investors will have to look at the 5 year projections and I am plenty sure by 2030, they will rock revenues in the tune of 200B, in the same zip code as Meta, Alphabet and still growing 50%. It's certainly risky but you are dealing with the company behind the AI revolution. Not saying they will win, but they have a shot to be most valuable company in this world.

givesendguh

Wtf is VC ? Beat earnings, 5000 shares traded in 30 min? 

Traul1983

It is not about how good the team is, it is about whether they are working for the fund buyers or the VC sellers.

teddyevelynmosby

Before you greedy all get excited getting into SpaceX in 2018, remember this, those cunts can prop up some BS voodoo unicorn project. Before they can effing some dumb VC money. Now it is coming for yours.

Willing_Clue3883

A large number of the dot-coms were drnk on VC cash and carrying tons of debt. Not the same situation this time around. Large tech companies are spending their own money this time. Some of them will fail, but I don't think will be the catastrophe some are making it out to be.

LostInThePurp

Going to be VC bagholders... love it

Aromatic-Elephant442

I cannot think of an IPO that didn’t immediately tank. They really only exist at this point because startups run out of VC money to incinerate, and need bigger idiots to fleece.

Certain-Tennis459

Robinhood giving retail “access” to pre-IPO sounds cool, but let’s not pretend we’re getting VC-level deals here. The real early money already ate. This feels more like packaged late-stage exposure with extra fees and hype. Also, since it’s a closed-end fund, it can trade at a discount to NAV — so you might not even get full value of the underlying holdings. Translation: not a scam, but definitely not free alpha either. Proceed accordingly.

No-Pair2650

Well most companies back in the day would have to have solid revenue and profitability to reach valuation of trillions. That's how Google, MSFT etc did it. They didn't start at that valuation. The problem is these newer IPOs are valued in a comparable manner to a Google or a Microsoft when they have nothing to show for it. So the only way is for price is down. I also doubt Robinhood pre-ipo investors are going to get much of a deal. If the stock tanks on day one they will be screwed. This is not a VC fund. You will be buying companies as exit liquidity for VCs and insiders.

SykoFI-RE

No no, this is only for the VC's to get their money out.

yeehawbudd

Of course that's your contention. You're a first-time SaaS bear. You just got finished listening to some podcast, Dario on Dwarkesh, probably. Now you think it’s the end of white collar work and seat-based pricing is screwed. You're gonna be convinced of that til tomorrow when you get to “Something Big is Happening”. Then you’ll install ClawdBot on a Mac Mini, vibe code a dashboard on top of a postgres database and say we’re all just a couple ralph loops away from building a Salesforce competitor. That’s gonna last until next week when you discover context graphs, and then you're gonna be talking about how the systems of record will be disintermediated by an agentic layer and reposting OAI marketing graphics. “Well, as a matter of fact, I won't, because ultimately the application layer is just ….” The application layer is just business logic on top a CRUD database. You got that from Satya’s appearance on the BG2 pod, December 2024, right? Yeah, I saw that too. Were you gonna plagiarize the whole thing for us? Do you have any thoughts of your own on this matter? Or...is that your thing? You get into the replies of anyone posting a SaaS ticker. You watch some podcast and then pawn it off as your own idea just to impress some VCs and embarrass some anon who’s long SaaS? See the sad thing about a guy like you is in a couple years you're gonna start doing some thinking on your own and you're gonna come up with the fact that there are two certainties in life. One: don't do that. And two: you dropped thirty grand on Mac Minis and LLM API calls to come to the same conclusion you could’ve got for free by following a handful of VC accounts.

HOMO_FOMO_69

They make no sense to me either, except for the fact that everything tech related is inflated because of the AI bubble (if you're investing in AI, you probably are also interested in Tech, Space, Quantum, etc). Energy companies also have WILD valuations. $OKLO has come down from the highs, but it's still wildly overvalued for what is essentially a research project. Simply put, the bubble is not just AI, but anything "cutting edge". AI has given investors overconfidence that their "next big thing" will succeed too just because AI has seemingly "succeeded". Doesn't mean other companies will ever see breakthroughs in quantum, or fusion energy, or XYZ new tech - but because AI had breakthroughs, "we can too". And that is the "vision" being sold to big VC and PE firms that are buying into the idea of "maybe I'm next".

Appropriate_Mixer

It will affect everyone. It will tank the market and money will move to private VC assets. If so many people’s retirement is tied to the market (it’s not just top 10% that rely on that money, even 10% of the total stock market is enough to be most of people’s total savings for retirement), it would devastate anyone that made a good decision to save for retirement in the stock market. It is the one easy method for the common person to grow their wealth and you want to destroy that? The common person doesn’t have enough to buy portions of companies in private VC sales. This would cause MORE wealth inequality not less.

WhoCares450

Yes and it's marketing garbage. We need real eval. No PE, VC or pharma pays what investor deck says.

1sailingaway

You make a good point. CA remains high for VC and is a high tax state, same as MA. Other factors override within the US like proximity to universities, ecosystem, education, etc. Country to country people are less driven to take risks and work hard if those results will be taken away by high tax rates reaching 50% and scaling significantly above 150k/yr. Never mind capital gains. There is a reason Europe’s productivity is not keeping pace.

Nac_Lac

Space is a bubble. And the cost to do it properly is ten times what is being spent now. SpaceX is moving fast and breaking things in a realm where failure is not an option. You don't get second chances in space, one mistake, one failure, and your entire mission is done. But wait, it gets worse. Your equipment is now uncontrollable and might hit something else. Starlinks are falling out of the sky regularly. The massive rocket Musk throws up to just explode violates multiple guidelines each time. Not to mention the pad they cratered and polluted the area around it despite being told it would do exactly that. The bubble is that hype is outpacing development and the expectation for every dollar spent is sky high. They believe they will get massive amounts of returns and be part of a big push to space. Instead, they aren't spending enough to ensure it's safe and reliable. Space is a bottomless pit for capital and somehow Musk has promised he can make it cheaper by cutting corners left and right. SpaceX is working despite his leadership and VC guidance, not because of it.

tcmart14

Need to throw AI in there somewhere. Then you can get 300 billion in VC funding at like a 10 trillion valuation.

bobdevnul

If you want VC money you have to play their game, not yours. Their money, their game. Maybe they don't believe in your business plan. They are risking their money. They don't have to have a reason that you agree with. It's not their function or responsibility to tell you why. Get over yourself.

btoned

This is NOT the case. These two platforms attract the LOWEST tier of talent. Have you ever seen the output? It's like using a coding IDE to spit out some boiler plate code, and I literally mean the boilerplate, and passing that off as your finished product and charging like $15 for it. These platforms got reach off of VC money that's it. Any respectable pro in their respective field would never recommend looking for talent on these platforms.

ForGreatDoge

There are better subreddits for this like someone else already said, but I can give a little insight here. I participate in VC rounds. "Vibes"... What they're saying without saying it is that they don't trust you (as a founder). This could be because they get the sense you're not being honest. That could mean deliberate salesmanship or could mean you're not considering potential gaps in the business plan (honest with yourself). It could also mean that you're not giving the energy level they want to see. You don't seem "hungry" enough. Unfortunately the idea can be great, but you're primarily making a bet on the people when it comes to VC.

Fuehnix

Wrong sub, this sub doesn't do VC

JEDuvall

Longtime Fundrise investor here, and I've been buying into the Innovation Fund since the outset about 2-3 years ago (the Innovation Fund is what is being proposed to move public under the VCX ticker). Happy to answer any questions that I can, but I do believe this is an extremely worthwhile investment vehicle for people to consider. In order to get this kind of early equity in the best private companies in the world, you either need to be an early employee or a VC investor, which has its own financial and access burdens of course. VCX, I believe, is set to pioneer a previously non-existent investment vehicle for public consumption, on the same level as eREITs and Index Funds. DXYZ is often mentioned as the "same" but they are not the same type of product.

KillaBeave

It's the same disruptor playbook that a lot of tech companies like Uber used. Sell at a loss until you have taken over the market and pushed the incumbents out. They can do this because money is essentially free and losses don't matter. For tech companies there was always more VC cash or crazy valuations. For the Chinese automakers it is the government subsidies that make losses irrelevant. I don't disagree that they make some compelling products and are pushing the industry forward hard. They certainly are and those cars are damned impressive. They can only do that at those prices with the massive subsidies and the lack of regulation they enjoy. Losing major manufacturing like automotive is truly a national security risk for the US and Europe. The supply chain backbone that it requires is largely the same one that enables defense manufacturing. The country that can produce the most will win any real conflict. If only one country can make anything complex at scale, we all have a problem. (Same story with microchips, rare earths etc.)

Creative-Sherbet-584

Intuit is getting slammed. Recently Accrual and some other AI company got VC attention

Ok-Zone-1430

Create a tech startup and rake in all that VC like the rest of 'em.

midwestck

Jobs are down, so they cut rates, which juices AI VC/capex, which induces a new round of layoffs, etc. Infinite funding secured. Calls on everything except low-middle class consumer brands. Don't get cute with puts.