
Ask HN: How to figure out if your stock options are worth exercising? - DidISayTooMuch
What are some of the indicators that you use to evaluate your current company and see if it&#x27;s worth exercising your vested stock options?
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davismwfl
That's a question without an easy answer IMO, at least without having a bunch
more data points about the company and your intentions.

Firstly, you need to know where the company is at on the funding chain, and
understand the key financials as it stands today. If the company is late
series stages you should have many more options, including potentially a
private exchange after you exercise. Also the larger % you hold gives you more
options as well, someone holding < 1% really isn't in the same position to
negotiate as someone holding 10%.

If the company is at the seed stage and hasn't raised their Series A then
exercising the options will almost never pay off. As a general rule, after the
series A the reason to exercise gets stronger with each successive round,
which should be obvious. But outside of that it is hard to generalize IMO.

Maybe someone else has some generic rules to follow, but I feel it takes a lot
of details to be able to formulate a reasonable decision here.

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DidISayTooMuch
Thanks for your reply. Sorry, I didn't add more details. The company has
completed a Series C funding. Revenue growth is over 50% yoy. But I fear
competition eating away the revenue in future. We just don't seem to have that
hockey stick growth.

Also, my main issue is that the exercise price is around $1.00, and I have
around 30K options, so I might be spending a good chunk of money.

