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Wefunder (YC W13): Invest in Startups

wefunder.com

31–40 of 83 posts

Re: Wefunder (YC W13): Invest in Startups

#31
post #20

Seed investing is not something for amateurs, in fact frankly I don't think investing in public companies is for amateurs. I would tell ordinary people to invest in index funds and don't invest in startups at all. You should not be investing in startups because you think it is going to change your life. You shouldn't be doing it unless you're rich enough that your life wouldn't be changed by making lots of money. - P…

I agree that ordinary people shouldn't bet their life savings on startups. But this allows an average well-informed SF employee to invest $1,000-2,000/month of his/her salary into any startup they like - hardly a life changing amount. See it as a Kickstarter on steroids. At least this gives us a chance too to invest in the next Dropbox and Airbnb.

Re: Wefunder (YC W13): Invest in Startups

#32
post #29
post #20

Seed investing is not something for amateurs, in fact frankly I don't think investing in public companies is for amateurs. I would tell ordinary people to invest in index funds and don't invest in startups at all. You should not be investing in startups because you think it is going to change your life. You shouldn't be doing it unless you're rich enough that your life wouldn't be changed by making lots of money. - P…

Wow, that's funny. As I was reading that, I was thinking "what a thoughtful comment for HN." At least I'm consistent. Twould be nice if you punctuated it properly though.

Interesting. It looks like one can summon PG by just quoting him. We should try this more often.

Re: Wefunder (YC W13): Invest in Startups

#33
post #20

Seed investing is not something for amateurs, in fact frankly I don't think investing in public companies is for amateurs. I would tell ordinary people to invest in index funds and don't invest in startups at all. You should not be investing in startups because you think it is going to change your life. You shouldn't be doing it unless you're rich enough that your life wouldn't be changed by making lots of money. - P…

Shouldn't that read "...unless you are rich enough that your life wouldn't be changed by losing lots of money."?

Re: Wefunder (YC W13): Invest in Startups

#34
post #29
post #20

Seed investing is not something for amateurs, in fact frankly I don't think investing in public companies is for amateurs. I would tell ordinary people to invest in index funds and don't invest in startups at all. You should not be investing in startups because you think it is going to change your life. You shouldn't be doing it unless you're rich enough that your life wouldn't be changed by making lots of money. - P…

Wow, that's funny. As I was reading that, I was thinking "what a thoughtful comment for HN." At least I'm consistent. Twould be nice if you punctuated it properly though.

Sorry transcribing from video is a little harder than from an essay. You try to tow the line between the speaker's rhythm and correct syntax to form the natural voice of the person speaking. Here is the video for the actual quote. http://www.bloomberg.com/video/breaking-down-billion-dollar-... skip to 4:47.

Re: Wefunder (YC W13): Invest in Startups

#35
Seems pretty interesting but after I certified for being an investor I got this:

Startups Fundraising Get first access to hot deals. 7 days left.

with no start ups listed. It seemed like there were a few presign up...

Re: Wefunder (YC W13): Invest in Startups

#36

"All the small investors (often So your company must create and manage a new investment vehicle for each startup to raise money on Wefunder? I assume so, otherwise the investors in one holding will incur the liability of the fund being sued by the investors/investment of another. According to your FAQ, you are not charging any fees yet and have raised about $500k to support your operations. On top of operating the pa…

That's right, small investors invest in a separate investment vehicle for each company that will requiere many of the actions that you describe. Second Market and Funders Club work the same way, and the costs do not amount to 10's of thousands of dollars per year. We have set aside enough funds deal with the future costs of each entity.

SecondMarket is a different animal -- they structure liquidity tenders for late-stage private companies and collect portal fees per seller, and, in the past, ordinary secondaries transaction vigs. They also run a large, traditional financial services business that has historically paid for much of their involvement in the startup world.

Funders Club is also a somewhat different animal -- they offer investors access to venture funds where risk is pooled, and also do single-purpose funds that resemble your product.

You are exclusively offering investors access to one investment and one set of risk. Let's say you can get it down to $4k/yr:

* Accountant to prepare and send out K1s to 50 shareholders $1000

* Delaware agent & franchise tax $400

* Legal, regulatory filings, 4 hrs $1000

* Your or your lawyer's time to give legally binding answers to questions from 50 shareholders $?

* Valuation analyst hired by you or firm, 5 hrs $600

* Broker dealer / misc / insurance $1000

These numbers sound pretty low to me but let's say you have economies of scale.

Making money solely when investors make money still seems like a reach. If you make 100 investments per year and have a decent team you will be burning a lot of cash -- the only way to recoup that cash will be to charge a transaction fee or keep raising money until carried interest pays out (which it often doesn't). Either way, it's something you should address in your disclosures.

It's one thing not to have a fleshed-out revenue model if you are a consumer site: nothing will happen if you die except for some upset users, but you can't just suddenly unwind a group of 400 investment funds when the underlying capital is tied up in illiquid private stock.

Re: Wefunder (YC W13): Invest in Startups

#37
Just applied to put $1k into a YC company that I was very impressed with.

I hope this becomes the default for YC companies. Fuck the VC's - invite the public to demo day and crowd fund the seed rounds!

Quick math: investing $1k into Facebook with the same terms would be worth over $8 million today. For Dropbox, over $600k. For an OMGPOP-sized exit, $25k.

Re: Wefunder (YC W13): Invest in Startups

#38
post #32
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, that's funny. As I was reading that, I was thinking "what a thoughtful comment for HN." At least I'm consistent. Twould be nice if you punctuated it properly though.

Interesting. It looks like one can summon PG by just quoting him. We should try this more often.

You have to say his name 3x.

Re: Wefunder (YC W13): Invest in Startups

#39
post #29
post #20

Seed investing is not something for amateurs, in fact frankly I don't think investing in public companies is for amateurs. I would tell ordinary people to invest in index funds and don't invest in startups at all. You should not be investing in startups because you think it is going to change your life. You shouldn't be doing it unless you're rich enough that your life wouldn't be changed by making lots of money. - P…

Wow, that's funny. As I was reading that, I was thinking "what a thoughtful comment for HN." At least I'm consistent. Twould be nice if you punctuated it properly though.

I'm a bit confused by this...why did you fund Wefunder then? "Amateurs" are exactly the people that will be funding startups on Wefunder...

Re: Wefunder (YC W13): Invest in Startups

#40
post #20

Seed investing is not something for amateurs, in fact frankly I don't think investing in public companies is for amateurs. I would tell ordinary people to invest in index funds and don't invest in startups at all. You should not be investing in startups because you think it is going to change your life. You shouldn't be doing it unless you're rich enough that your life wouldn't be changed by making lots of money. - P…

I agree that ordinary people shouldn't bet their life savings on startups. But this allows an average well-informed SF employee to invest $1,000-2,000/month of his/her salary into any startup they like - hardly a life changing amount. See it as a Kickstarter on steroids. At least this gives us a chance too to invest in the next Dropbox and Airbnb.

Worth noting: $1,000-2,000/month stashed in a less risky asset class (e.g. index funds) over 30 years is likely to be enough for most people to retire comfortably. That's potentially life changing over the long term.
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