[tptacek]

Isn't this essentially an argument that companies should deliberately slow their growth before an IPO just to demonstrate to skittish investors (all of whom either shouldn't be picking stocks of any sort, or are themselves professional money managers who can read an S1 and a 10K) that they can be profitable without collapsing?

Profits are good, but inability to switch from growth mode to profit-taking mode is probably not the risk that should keep you from investing in Crowdstrike; the volatility of the market they're in and their exposure to technological changes is a much bigger concern.

Crowdstrike isn't like Uber, where the dial from profitable to unprofitable is essentially the question about the business. They're an enterprise software company and the majority of their money goes to sales. We have something like 30 years of experience in how these kinds of companies operate and what's going to happen with their financial engineering.

I'm not saying Crowdstrike isn't risky. They're crazy risky and I wouldn't invest personally! I'm just saying, it's easy to get companies like this confused with consumer-facing unicorn companies whose valuations are derived in part by subsidizing their customers. Crowdstrike is, if anything, infamous for the opposite thing (they're expensive).