Prominent venture capital firm investing in early- to growth-stage technology companies globally.sequoiacap.com ↗
2 takes · first discussed Jul 19, 2024
Private company — no public price to score. We track what they said; valuation-mark tracking is on the roadmap.
Chamath is skeptical of Sequoia's cross-fund Stripe secondary, calling inter-fund liquidity transactions 'verboten' from a governance standpoint and potentially self-serving for GPs, though acknowledging the valuation mark-up is a positive signal.
Sacks views Sequoia's secondary solution for legacy fund LPs as an elegant and practical way to provide liquidity on long-held private positions like Stripe without forcing investors to exit.
The hosts are divided on Sequoia's inter-fund secondary transaction involving Stripe. Sacks is broadly supportive, viewing the SPV-based structure as an elegant and practical mechanism that gives legacy fund LPs optional liquidity on long-held private positions without forcing anyone to exit. Chamath takes a more skeptical stance, acknowledging that the valuation mark-up is a positive signal but raising governance concerns about one Sequoia fund effectively transacting with another, which he characterizes as potentially self-serving for GPs and "unseemly." The core disagreement is whether the deal's LP-friendly optionality outweighs the conflict-of-interest questions inherent in cross-fund liquidity arrangements.
Chamath is skeptical of Sequoia's cross-fund Stripe secondary, calling inter-fund liquidity transactions 'verboten' from a governance standpoint and potentially self-serving for GPs, though acknowledging the valuation mark-up is a positive signal.
I don't like these kinds of like things where one fund is basically scratching the back of another fund. It's— it always tends to be the case that this stuff on the surface looks a little smelly and can be a little unseemly.”1:03:35
Sacks views Sequoia's secondary solution for legacy fund LPs as an elegant and practical way to provide liquidity on long-held private positions like Stripe without forcing investors to exit.
if you have a security that's not public yet, but is semi-liquid because it's a very late-stage private company, then what you can do is spin those shares into an SPV... nobody is forced to give up their ownership position, but if they”1:05:25