[HN Gopher] Payments giant Stripe raises $6.5B at a $50B valuation
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Payments giant Stripe raises $6.5B at a $50B valuation
Author : alihm
Score : 29 points
Date : 2023-03-15 21:11 UTC (1 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.axios.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.axios.com)
| tschellenbach wrote:
| Higher than Adyen, seems too high perhaps? Probably some
| structure in this deal to enable the higher valuation
| nrmitchi wrote:
| > Probably some structure in this deal to enable the higher
| valuation
|
| It's almost definitely a liquidation preference to ensure that
| these new investors are going to get their $6.5B out first in
| the event of any Stripe liquidity event, and it seems
| _extremely_ unlikely that Stripe ends up exiting for less than
| $6.5B.
|
| All-in-all this investment seems like a pretty good way to
| guarantee that you won't lose money (aside from to inflation).
| vosper wrote:
| > All proceeds will be used to help Stripe employees cover tax
| obligations related to the pending expiration of restricted stock
| units, plus to fund a new stock tender offer for current and
| former employees.
|
| > The stock tender is voluntary, with employees eligible to sell
| as few or as many vested shares as they want (i.e. zero-100%).
|
| This seems like they're doing their employees a solid here. But I
| have a stupid question: who's the buyer for the shares? I'm
| guessing it's Stripe, with the money they raised. Then where do
| the shares go - are they allocated to the investors who just
| funded this raise, or are they destroyed so that the value held
| by the remaining shareholders increases?
|
| Or do we just not know?
| stanleydrew wrote:
| Presumably the new money is in exchange for some newly-created
| class of preferred shares. Stripe holds the cash until it
| repurchases common shares from employees or any other holders,
| and those shares would go back into the unallocated common
| stock pool I'd assume. So yes, I'd think the only way this
| works is for Stripe to be the purchaser.
| theGnuMe wrote:
| Seems like a good deal for the employees if they can unload 100%.
| edwinwee wrote:
| (Dupe of https://stripe.com/newsroom/news/stripe-series-i-
| employee-li... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35175063)
| rvz wrote:
| Unsurprisingly and as expected. As I said before back in 2019 [0]
| and a year ago [1], the time to IPO was in 2019 and back then,
| Stripe had no plans to IPO and instead took a series of down-
| rounds from its high of $95BN, then $74BN [2], $63BN [3] and now
| $50BN.
|
| Oh dear.
|
| [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20993919
|
| [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31062658
|
| [2] https://www.wsj.com/articles/stripe-cuts-internal-
| valuation-...
|
| [3] https://www.theinformation.com/articles/stripe-cuts-
| internal...
| sharkweek wrote:
| I wont feign any deeper understanding here, but wouldn't it
| have been just as bad (and perhaps worse??) if they had been
| public over the last couple years?
|
| I.e., wouldn't the public market have shredded their stock
| apart even more if this is how even the private financial
| markets are handling their current positions/views of the
| business?
|
| I suppose if the goal was to create a big exciting exit event
| for employees and private shareholders a 2019 IPO would have
| been great, but I'm imagining a bunch of that wealth is wiped
| out by a downturn in public prices too.
| [deleted]
| eganist wrote:
| > wouldn't it have been just as bad (and perhaps worse??) if
| they had been public over the last couple years?
|
| Bad for who? The original investors would've gotten their
| exit at a superlative valuation, and with any eventual
| downturn, Stripe would've gotten to buy their own shares back
| at a discount.
|
| The bagholders would've been institutional investors, so I
| guess bad for _all of us_ by proxy (401ks etc) but they would
| 've made out like bandits.
| stanleydrew wrote:
| Just as bad for whom?
|
| I think the big difference is that with a public market for
| their shares, Stripe itself probably wouldn't need to sell
| new shares in "down rounds."
|
| Yes the stock price would fluctuate on the secondary market
| and certainly would have dropped since 2021, but equity
| holders wouldn't be dependent on Stripe raising funds or
| organizing tender offers to sell.
| DueDilligence wrote:
| [dead]
| illiarian wrote:
| Their net revenue is estimated at about 3.5-3 billion.
|
| Why in the seven hells would they need 6.5 billion on top of
| that? Are they building gold-plated toilets at their offices?
|
| Edit: I commented before reading: this is related to employees'
| stocks, taxes etc., and Strip says it's not needed to run the
| business itself.
| ctvo wrote:
| > Why in the seven hells would they need 6.5 billion on top of
| that? Are they building gold-plated toilets at their offices?
|
| It's worth reading the article before commenting:
|
| > All proceeds will be used to help Stripe employees cover tax
| obligations related to the pending expiration of restricted
| stock units, plus to fund a new stock tender offer for current
| and former employees.
| ctvo wrote:
| > The stock tender is voluntary, with employees eligible to sell
| as few or as many vested shares as they want (i.e. zero-100%).
|
| 100% at any price is interesting let alone whatever they're
| getting.
| [deleted]
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