
Facebook raises $150 million more to cash out employees  - peter123
http://venturebeat.com/2009/05/16/facebook-raises-150-million-more-to-cash-out-employees/
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peter123
The fact that employees are willing to cash out now might mean that they are
less confident about the potential of cashing out big in the future. I'm sure
no early Google employee would even think of cashing out pre-IPO.

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cperciva
_The fact that employees are willing to cash out now might mean that they are
less confident about the potential of cashing out big in the future._

It might. Or it might just mean that some employees want to buy houses, new
cars, etc.

People are very good at "doing without" when they're starting a new company,
but there's a point where life catches up and they want to start living in a
bit of comfort. This goes double (or more) for those people who have families
-- I'm not sure quite how one would explain to a 3 year old that they're not
getting the toys they want because daddy wants to hold on to his stock options
so that he can become a millionaire when facebook IPOs a few years from now.

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sanj
I don't believe that salaries at Facebook are hugely depressed based on
burgeoning stock options. Glassdoor (self-) reports them in the >100k range.

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wheels
How many share holders total does Facebook have now? My gut reaction to
hearing this was that perhaps they were nearing the limit where they would be
forced to go public and that this might be a stop-gap so that they can time
their IPO more conveniently.

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falsestprophet
No company if forced to "go public" by trading on a public exchange. But the
Securities & Exchange Act of 1934 requires public disclosure of some
financials after a company accumulates 500 shareholders and $10 million in
assets.

The SEC granted Facebook an exception in November 2008 because many of the
shareholders hold restricted stock. Read more below:

[http://www.insidefacebook.com/2008/11/23/facebook-gets-
sec-d...](http://www.insidefacebook.com/2008/11/23/facebook-gets-sec-
disclosure-exemption-as-number-of-stockholders-grows/)

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blhack
_But it’s another sign that large private companies like Facebook are
desperately seeking ways to find “liquidity” for their employees — especially
now that the IPO market remains difficult, in particular for_ unprofitable
_companies._

Well, this sounds fantastic.

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sanj
What is Facebook's motivation for doing this?

It doesn't seem like it'd improve employee retention -- the folks would take
the money and run!

