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WeWork says will file to withdraw IPO

reuters.com

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Re: WeWork says will file to withdraw IPO

#2
This whole thing has been nuts. It's clear no one who invested late ever actually believed in the valuations -- matt levine says it better

"We came to market and public investors informally expressed some skepticism and its private backers were immediately like “wait this company isn’t profitable, why did no one tell us, burn it all down.” I am not saying that the public markets are wrong, but I kind of wanted there to be a difference of opinion; I kind of wanted the people who bought WeWork at a $47 billion valuation to act like they meant it."

Re: WeWork says will file to withdraw IPO

#5

This whole thing has been nuts. It's clear no one who invested late ever actually believed in the valuations -- matt levine says it better "We came to market and public investors informally expressed some skepticism and its private backers were immediately like “wait this company isn’t profitable, why did no one tell us, burn it all down.” I am not saying that the public markets are wrong, but I kind of wanted there…

Even simpler: it's fraud and they got caught. Hopefully it doesn't paint other great IPOs in a bad light.

Re: WeWork says will file to withdraw IPO

#6
post #4

Incoming layoffs... between wework and uber the market will be "flooded" with talent. I wonder if having wework on your resume is a good or bad thing.

How many engineers does WeWork actually employ though? From everything I've read on here they're not really a tech company. I can't imagine that, even if it all goes up in flames, there will be many SWEs looking for new jobs from this.

Uber is another story. They've got a sizeable engineering force.

Re: WeWork says will file to withdraw IPO

#9
post #5

This whole thing has been nuts. It's clear no one who invested late ever actually believed in the valuations -- matt levine says it better "We came to market and public investors informally expressed some skepticism and its private backers were immediately like “wait this company isn’t profitable, why did no one tell us, burn it all down.” I am not saying that the public markets are wrong, but I kind of wanted there…

Even simpler: it's fraud and they got caught. Hopefully it doesn't paint other great IPOs in a bad light.

> Hopefully it doesn't paint other great IPOs in a bad light.

Are you thinking of any in particular? Attention toward IPOs (especially on HN) go almost exclusively to bad IPOs. Fair offerings seem to get ignored.

Edit: Peloton is one that comes to mind. Nearly $1 billion in sales, up 40% YoY. Although even they are posting a net loss of a quarter billion.

Re: WeWork says will file to withdraw IPO

#10
Wow what a huge rise and fall in the past few weeks! What I don't understand is how the S-1 filing ever saw the light of day? How could nobody reviewing that see any of the red flags that were obvious?

I think this just shows how hard it is to be objective when there are so many cultural/financial/etc influences affecting your judgement. Obviously their team bought the hype (and as a sad Browns fan I can totally sympathize with buying into hype then being disappointed!)

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