Rupert Murdoch Cashes in US$125M of Theranos Stock for US$1 | Hacker News Reader

Rupert Murdoch Cashes in US$125M of Theranos Stock for US$1

stuff.co.nz

29 pointsopenmosix10 comments

> US$125 million of Theranos stock for US$1

I thought it was a click-bait title, but after reading the story, I am a little confused.

Why would he take a $125 ( minus 1 $) loss? Tax credits? Or was / is the stock worthless and the $125 mil is what he originally paid for, or accrued in value?

You can't realize the loss until you actually sell it. If you're about to realize 100 million in profits, it's better to offset that with a loss now than dragging it out over the next decade.

Murdoch invested in Theranos ~100M a few years ago https://www.theguardian.com/media/2016/nov/29/rupert-murdoch... You can only consider the investment "failed" if the company goes belly up. Till then, you have to wait to write the investment off (and request a tax credit on the loss). Selling it is a way to proof your investment is now worth ~zero - so you can write it off in the next fiscal year.

I don't understand why do you get a tax credit for a loss in stock investment. You don't get a tax credit for any other loss!

About the only way the rest of society will see any of the wealth he is sitting on.

I have no idea what this means since he's selling for a loss to minimize the amount of money he returns to society in the form of taxes.

Theranos did not have a product/market fit not because they didn't try but they didn't actually have a working product at all it seems from the article. It's interesting to see they've been kept afloat by big name investors all these years.

edit: why is this comment being downvoted? Theranos failed and now looks like investors are angry. Do you disagree?

"not having product/market fit" is an interesting way of describing a company that is being actively investigated for fraud by the SEC.

not having product/market fit because you don't have a product but acted like you did needs to be audited.

Note that this is different from not having product/market because of lack of demand. which sums up SV startups.

It's one thing to rip people off, it's a whole another to build an entire company around a non existent product. The latter takes some Talented Mr. Ripley level of Machiavellianism ( or/and being born to a rich white connected sugar daddy).

I think ppl are downvoting you because referring to Theranos' situation using a product/market fit model presupposes you have a product for the market to accept or reject. The product that they promised to the market certainly had high demand/fit, that's why got so much investment. Theranos simply didn't have anything close to what they were promising, hence the fraud.

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