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by chollida1
2867 days ago
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Maybe I wasn't clear but I don't think I ever setup the straw man you knocked down saying an employee shouldn't ever be able to sell. All I said was its very reasonable, as evidenced by the fact that every IPO over the past 40 years has had a lockup, to have a 3-6 month hold period for existing share holders when you go public. That's it. I( and GOOG, FB, AMZN, SNAP, and the rest of the entire tech community that went public ) all believe that a 3- 6 month hold window is a very reasonable ask given that they all had one. Sorry if I confused you, I hope this clears things up:) |
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It is normal for banks conducting an IPO to want one set of things, and for early employees and early investors to want another. Both lockup periods and a chance to have an IPO pop are things that banks conducting an IPO want to have. The company itself has no desire for either, but are pushed into them.
It is normal to hand over as much as a quarter of a company's value to rich people who are lucky enough to get into an IPO. It is normal to force early employees to stay out of the market for an extended period of time. I personally know a number of people who during the dot com crash wound up with a tax bill that exceeded their salary and no way to pay it. (Their company IPOed, thereby locking them in under AMT rules. By the time they could sell, the dot com crash had happened and they didn't make enough to pay their taxes.)
The fact that these things are normal does not mean that they are fair and reasonable. Just that they are business as usual.
It is no surprise that a company which bucked Wall St on one issue would challenge both of them.