[bargl]

It would be nice if there was a VC that could operate like the stock market was supposed to. You invest in the VC and you get a share out. But that share can be really really small. 100$ or less. And you get an ROI. I've thought about that before but I have no clue how or what shape that would take with my limited knowledge of the legality behind VC funding.

[twic]

Is this assuming that the venture capital industry outperforms the general stock market? I don't think it consistently does. I don't have massive or recent data, but here's a report from a few years ago:

https://nvca.org/pressreleases/venture-capital-outperformed-...

Despite the headline, if you compare the venture capital indexes with the S&P 500, there's no clear winner. Except at the 50-year time horizon, where the early-stage index went to the moon. Good luck investing in that.

[frgtpsswrdlame]

It's not just about returns but also diversification. An open VC would allow people to invest in early-stage companies, not just mid/late-stage companies like the stock market. You'd never want to have too much of it because of the enhanced risk but a small allocation for diversity wouldn't be bad.

[bargl]

I was more thinking that the stock market is being gamed by a massive amount of computers where as I don't see that happening in VC yet.

[currymj]

HFT has a lot of impacts and may be good or bad overall, or socially useless, or whatever. but it undeniably does result in a better deal for a normal person trying to make small investments -- they've replaced the old market makers but charge much less for the job.

[tonystubblebine]

A lot of VC returns are based on eyeballs and a lot of eyeballs are actually giant Bot networks.

[Aunche]

The reason you can't do that is to protect the system from abuse. Kickstarter already has a bunch of scammers, but it's not as bad because people are spending disposable income on it and not using it as an investment. As soon as you let the average Joe speculate on start-ups, thousands of companies will pop up trying to figure out the best way to scam people.

[theseatoms]

How is this different than the stock market?

[bargl]

VC has access to these stocks before they are available on the stock market. These are also stocks that aren't traded in micro transactions so they can't be gamed by Machine Learning.