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I know this is totally standard and everything, but imagine if we applied this to any other context:

- The “internal” assessment of the bridge’s strength, and the external assessment of the people who drive over it

- In politics, you have a “public position” and a “private position”

Makes you think!

I don't think it's as nefarious as that. What people are calling the "public" position here is the value of preferred stock sold in a financing, and the "internal" valuation is the value of common stock. They're different things - the preferred stock has downside protection and other special rights that make it more valuable than the common stock so it should have a different price. These internal valuation reports pretty explicitly calculate the value of the common stock as a discount applied to the preferred stock price, due to the rights and liquidation preferrence and the fact that the common is not freely tradable.

The first one is not analogous since it is not the same bridge. As pbreit pointed out, the terms are different.

The second one is true in any human to human relationship. I would not believe anyone’s outwardly stated thoughts exactly match their internal ones.

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