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Comment by zrail | Hacker News Reader

The problem is that employees of these large private companies are working for somewhat below market wages in exchange for illiquid equity. If these companies stay private for a long time they either have to cash out equity or offer more cash compensation.

Edit: option tender offers are absolutely a thing but I don’t think I’ve ever heard of an RSU tender offer.

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I think the issue is, that many don't even have a working business model and are despesrate to find one after they went public. Even though sometimes, there is simply no business model, no way to earn money with a service, no way to make a profit. And in such a situation a company should pay their employees in equity or take money from investors who essentially speculate for a good IPO to get their investment back.

I kind of wish the startups would direct-list on the stock market, and then the early employees have liquidity from the start. This doesn't stop the company raising more money if they're young, they can still issue shares. I'm guessing that theres some downsides to this that I'm not seeing, anyone know?

Once a stock has at least 2,000 acredited shareholders or 500 unacredited shareholders (was 500 shareholders without regard to acreditation before the 2012 Jobs Act), SEC disclosure requirements apply the same as if had IPOd. Allowing/encouraging trading of the stock is going accelerate the time that that happens. Facebook aproaching the shareholder limit was one of the things that pushed them to IPO --- might as well raise some money if you have to prepare all the disclosures and follow all the accounting rules, anyway.

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