If you want to see the face of capitalism, look to Carl Icahn.
That's not capitalism, that's greed. Sadly, many of the greedy are hiding behind the banner of capitalism, but don't be confused.
When Carl Icahn Ran a Company: The Story of TWA
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Re: When Carl Icahn Ran a Company: The Story of TWA
#72The sketchiest thing about Andreeson is that he sits on the board of directors for HP... and at no point has he told investors that it's a rudderless shell of it's former self with almost no hope.
Re: When Carl Icahn Ran a Company: The Story of TWA
#73I'd like to see Marc be a bit more vicious about this, starting with Herbalife as the first target.
Re: When Carl Icahn Ran a Company: The Story of TWA
#74It's kind of absurd how closely Carl Icahn's mirrors that of the story of Gordon Gekko in Oliver Stone's movie Wall Street . What Icahn did to TWA is pretty much exactly what Gekko did (or planned to do) to Bluestar Airlines in that film. Longer period of time - but in principle, very similar.
I think he was the inspiration for Gekko in the film.
Maybe, but also Ivan Boesky, to whom the Greed is good quote is attributed.
Re: When Carl Icahn Ran a Company: The Story of TWA
#75In my view, after his humiliation by Apple's board, Carl Icahn feels his power (and by proxy the power of wall street) slowly and surely being stripped away by tech. This is at the root of his obsession with pmarca, who famously claimed that "software is eating the world." The world that's being eaten is the world of Icahn and wall street financiers like him. The tech industry has its own source of finance (namely an…
I can't presume to understand Carl Icahn (as you admitted as well) but IMHO, this is untrue and can lead fellow HNers into an echo chamber. First, Wall Street's role in capital markets towers over Silicon Valley. Venture Capital Assets Under Management is approximately $200 billion. Blackrock, the world's largest fund, has $4.3 trillion AUM. Second, while I believe pmarca acted entirely in good faith and is legally i…
> First, Wall Street's role in capital markets towers over Silicon Valley.
True, but what's the delta? Where are the sources of new power (and subsequently wealth) being generated? Why, for that matter, are you a former investment banker and now a tech-cofounder and coder? As I'm sure you know, you're not the only one who's made that (smart) move.
What moving around money was to the 19XXs, moving around information is to the 20XXs. That's the crux of "software is eating the world".
AUM doesn't seem a useful metric for power, in fact it's debt and so it all depends on what you do with it. What % of those assets are depreciating? How fast are the % of assets that are appreciating doing so?
I know little about capital markets, but these seem like the obvious begged questions, don't they?
Re: When Carl Icahn Ran a Company: The Story of TWA
#76In my view, after his humiliation by Apple's board, Carl Icahn feels his power (and by proxy the power of wall street) slowly and surely being stripped away by tech. This is at the root of his obsession with pmarca, who famously claimed that "software is eating the world." The world that's being eaten is the world of Icahn and wall street financiers like him. The tech industry has its own source of finance (namely an…
I can't presume to understand Carl Icahn (as you admitted as well) but IMHO, this is untrue and can lead fellow HNers into an echo chamber. First, Wall Street's role in capital markets towers over Silicon Valley. Venture Capital Assets Under Management is approximately $200 billion. Blackrock, the world's largest fund, has $4.3 trillion AUM. Second, while I believe pmarca acted entirely in good faith and is legally i…
> First, Wall Street's role in capital markets towers over Silicon Valley. Venture Capital Assets Under Management is approximately $200 billion. Blackrock, the world's largest fund, has $4.3 trillion AUM.
This isn't really an apples to apples comparison. Most of the money managed by the big players like Blackrock is in funds that are tied to specific benchmarks and have very restrictive mandates. Relatively little of it can be redirected towards funding new companies.
Re: When Carl Icahn Ran a Company: The Story of TWA
#77Earlier quoted context omitted.
From what I've read, Icahn argues that the companieshe's going up against aren't do a good job of running the company. If that's true, Icahn is doing shareholders a service.
Given what he did with TWA and reselling tickets, its hard to think that served any other shareholder but himself.
Whenever I hear a story about someone being "underhanded" and "of low character" I always see what the other side of the story is. Usually, the truth isn't so straightforward.
It appears that TWA owed him money so he negotiated the cheap ticket as a form of payment...[1] How convenient that Marc left that out of his blog post...
In the interim, Icahn negotiated for airline vouchers from the company in lieu of the $190 million that TWA owed him. As the deal included the provision that he could not sell these tickets through travel agents, Icahn founded LowestFare.com, where he both sold the tickets and created a revolution in the travel industry.
[1]http://www.investopedia.com/articles/financial-theory/08/car...
Re: When Carl Icahn Ran a Company: The Story of TWA
#78If you want to see the face of capitalism, look to Carl Icahn.
That's not capitalism, that's greed. Sadly, many of the greedy are hiding behind the banner of capitalism, but don't be confused.
It's exactly capitalism. Carl Icahn, capitalist, used capital to establish control over TWA and, having done so, exercised his property rights in a way to maximize profit and return.
Re: When Carl Icahn Ran a Company: The Story of TWA
#79Earlier quoted context omitted.
I can't presume to understand Carl Icahn (as you admitted as well) but IMHO, this is untrue and can lead fellow HNers into an echo chamber. First, Wall Street's role in capital markets towers over Silicon Valley. Venture Capital Assets Under Management is approximately $200 billion. Blackrock, the world's largest fund, has $4.3 trillion AUM. Second, while I believe pmarca acted entirely in good faith and is legally i…
> First, Wall Street's role in capital markets towers over Silicon Valley. True, but what's the delta ? Where are the sources of new power (and subsequently wealth) being generated? Why, for that matter, are you a former investment banker and now a tech-cofounder and coder? As I'm sure you know, you're not the only one who's made that (smart) move. What moving around money was to the 19XXs, moving around information…
New power/wealth generation is and will be in finance for the foreseeable future. I can go into great detail on this but for TL;DR purposes, I will generalize: finance > tech in making aggregate money because finance only cares about making money and tech cares about a lot of other things, which in turn generates money.
I moved into tech because I liked it, not to make money. If I were still in investment banking, I'd be making 7figures a year (and killing my soul in the process). This is not a judgment call; it's a personal choice. There exists good-willed bankers as well as selfish, rent-seeking coders.
Moving money around has not been limited to the 19XXs. It's been around since humans put a face of an important person on some piece of metal (actually earlier, but it lacks the imagery).
Re: When Carl Icahn Ran a Company: The Story of TWA
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
I can't presume to understand Carl Icahn (as you admitted as well) but IMHO, this is untrue and can lead fellow HNers into an echo chamber. First, Wall Street's role in capital markets towers over Silicon Valley. Venture Capital Assets Under Management is approximately $200 billion. Blackrock, the world's largest fund, has $4.3 trillion AUM. Second, while I believe pmarca acted entirely in good faith and is legally i…
> First, Wall Street's role in capital markets towers over Silicon Valley. Venture Capital Assets Under Management is approximately $200 billion. Blackrock, the world's largest fund, has $4.3 trillion AUM. This isn't really an apples to apples comparison. Most of the money managed by the big players like Blackrock is in funds that are tied to specific benchmarks and have very restrictive mandates. Relatively little o…
Who said anything about funding new companies?
We're talking about leverage and wealth generation. Big AUM means bigger fees. Non-VC funds like hedge funds and private equity are incentivized to have huge funds because they get the fees. Since most of their work is financial engineering, more AUM means more leverage and is an advantage.
Large VC funds are disadvantaged because they're investing in growth. A 20x return off a $5M investment is more common than a 20x return off a $100M investment.
I don't think it helps either community to pit one against the other. Finance and tech are different and serve different purposes and let's leave it at that.