Financial Misstatements • Hacker News Board

Re: Financial Misstatements

#191

Post by hussong » Sat, Aug 22, 2015, 3:31 PM UTC

Havoc wrote: post #179

saurabhtandon wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here is the wiki definition - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gross_merchandise_volume eBay and many other marketplaces use it. My guess is that since these marketplace platforms are not actual retailers their GMV is pretty high as compared to revenue. To showcase the dollar value of total sales that happened on the platform they use GMV. But again I am not an expert in this field.

>Here is the wiki definition - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gross_merchandise_volume Yeah I googled it too - a while ago - wikipedia isn't exactly a winning moving here. >eBay and many other marketplaces use it. That is deeply disingenuous. You originally said its "term of the trade in the retailing". I called bullsht - because I know its not used in retailing. In response you shift your argument (!!!) and reckon it…

I think you were accidentaly conflating the two users sumanthvepa and saurabhtandon (happened to me too, btw).

Personal attacks aside, you point still stands and I want to thank you for bringing some actual financial expertise into the discussion :-)

Re: Financial Misstatements

#192

Post by fredgrott » Sat, Aug 22, 2015, 4:10 PM UTC

Note that the freelancer startups do this emphatically...

UpWork Toptal Gun.io

all list Revenue as total amount via gigs posted not as total amount actually awarded via finished gigs..ie project revenue on system which means that they are over or understating their actual earhed revenue from project fees

Easy to catch as in accounting terms you would list the full project revenue listed on system times the percent project fees as unearned revenue and the booked earned project fee revenue as earned revenue.

Re: Financial Misstatements

#193

Post by ScottBurson » Sat, Aug 22, 2015, 4:26 PM UTC

Havoc wrote: post #155

kevin wrote: post #8

Here's the biggest offenders I see when talking to founders: revenue vs GMV (if you give GMV, give me your cut/margin) contract vs LOI burn vs expenses users vs customers (customers pay) signups vs users vs active users (you should give active with time interval and measurement of active. eg. logged in last 30 days) profitable vs cash flow positive Others people should know: diff between retention rate vs churn rate…

>“GMV” (gross merchandise volume) Interesting...been in finance all my life & dealt with pretty much every industry out there...never heard this one before. Must be some type of startup slang so to speak.

Maybe it's not used in your part of the world, but it's #6 on this list by Andreessen Horowitz: http://a16z.com/2015/08/21/16-metrics/

Re: Financial Misstatements

#194

Post by bbeneschott » Sat, Aug 22, 2015, 4:39 PM UTC

fredgrott wrote: post #192

Note that the freelancer startups do this emphatically... UpWork Toptal Gun.io all list Revenue as total amount via gigs posted not as total amount actually awarded via finished gigs..ie project revenue on system which means that they are over or understating their actual earhed revenue from project fees Easy to catch as in accounting terms you would list the full project revenue listed on system times the percent pr…

Background: I am the COO of Toptal

This is simply not true for Toptal. Our publicly stated $80,000,000 ARR is top line.

http://www.toptal.com/press-center/top-3-percent

For additional clarification:

You don't post "projects" on Toptal. Everything we do is time & materials, so the concept of misrepresenting financials based on posted projects simply isn't possible. ARR is calculated by actual sales right now multiplied out for a year of time.