The point is that with public equity shares, the extrapolation from the price of a single share to the value of the entire company is much simpler. This is for two reasons: first, everybody owns the same security; second, the payoffs are continuous in the market price of the shares.
Neither of these things hold for VC investments. Not everyone owns the same security, and payoffs are NOT continuous in the market price of the shares. This is because of the liquidity preference that is usually part of the deal.
Valuation is valuation - let's not confuse it with what will happen in the future - just because a company is worth 2 billion today, doesn't mean it will be worth that or more in X years.
No, valuation is not just valuation. I've just spelled out two reasons valuations can sometimes not be directly comparable. That's the whole point.
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The point is that with public equity shares, the extrapolation from the price of a single share to the value of the entire company is much simpler. This is for two reasons: first, everybody owns the same security; second, the payoffs are continuous in the market price of the shares.
Neither of these things hold for VC investments. Not everyone owns the same security, and payoffs are NOT continuous in the market price of the shares. This is because of the liquidity preference that is usually part of the deal.
No, valuation is not just valuation. I've just spelled out two reasons valuations can sometimes not be directly comparable. That's the whole point.