[rmason]

I was running a startup during the dotcom boom. Started seeing successful entrepreneurs selling growing businesses where it didn't make any sense. They were young and I thought in five years their company would be worth 10x, so why not hold on?

What I learned was that some people have the talent to spot a market top. Some equally smart people hung on and in a few years had nothing and their investors were left holding an empty bag. One person isn't a trend but when you see multiple people selling for no apparent reason that's a clue to start playing very close attention.

The only time in my life that I was pretty certain of a decline was in 2007. Knew some real estate people who complained of crazy funny business going on. Things that reminded them of an earlier crash. They were told by younger people that the rules of the game had changed and what they thought was crazy was just the new normal and to get used to it. I thought where had I heard that before? Yep, the dotcom go go years. I advised them to trust their gut feelings.