2019年的IPO给风投界留下了哪些教训？

从470亿美元到100亿美元，WeWork估值的断崖式下跌，也算创下了2019年之最了。除了上市失败的WeWork，还有很多今年上市的公司都遇到了类似的问题，即企业在上市前后的估值存在着巨大的差距。因此，一些私营企业的增长情况不免令人生疑。

首先需要肯定的是，今年美国也不乏IPO成功的案例（比如Zoom Video Communications、Datadog、Pinterest等等），不过失败的IPO也不在少数，比如Lyft、Uber和Slack，这三家公司的股价比IPO发行价至少下跌了20%。作为刚上市的“独角兽”公司之一，SmileDirectClub上市后的表现也令投资者感到失望，上市第一天就下跌了28%左右。健身公司Peloton Interactive首日下跌超过11%。WeWork更名为the We Company后，更是直接放弃了年底前上市的打算。面对这种情况，投资者和分析师们都表达了类似的担忧：今年私人市场和公开市场的估值存在严重差异，私人投资者很可能会赔掉不少钱。

乔治城大学金融市场和政策中心主任、金融学教授里纳·阿加瓦尔表示：“我认为，这种情况也会影响到私人市场的估值，市场上的过度乐观情绪将有所消退。”

复兴资本（Renaissance Capital）的负责人凯瑟琳·史密斯认为，今年以来，私人市场上的大量流动资本为许多公司提供了充足的资金，其中，对一些公司的投资可以说是过度投资。有了这些私人投资的孵化，企业就不必过分担心烧钱率或盈利计划等重要问题。但这种局面也在发生变化。

谈到私人市场的资本过剩问题时，史密斯对《财富》杂志表示：“‘不计代价的增长’只在廉价资本时代管用。现在的问题是，它是不是会导致其他公司的资本枯竭？”

有些基金已经因为这个问题而陷入了麻烦，比如软银的愿景基金（Uber和WeWork都有它的投资）。在史密斯看来，像WeWork这样的案例（史密斯称之为一个“警世寓言”）也指出了投资者必须面临的一个更广泛的问题。

“WeWork的例子在流动性上给私人市场敲了警钟——一家拥有120亿美元投资和470亿美元潜在估值的公司，为什么无法在公开市场上市？对于每一家私人投资的公司，这都是一个值得警惕的问题。如果你也是私人市场参与者，那么这个案例也给你敲了警钟——现在他们必须仔细审视自己投资的每一家公司了。”

那么，2019年的这几个IPO失败的例子，给私人市场留下了哪些教训？

审查缺位的风险

华尔街的一些专家指出，在2019年的这几个IPO中，审查机制的缺位都是一个大问题，特别是对那些蒙受着巨大亏损，却又有着不切实际的目标（比如Peloton公司的口号是“我们卖的是幸福”。WeWork的口号是“提升全世界的意识”），而且盈利计划模糊的公司。

Triton是一家专业评估新上市公司的公司，该公司的创始人及首席执行官雷特·华莱士认为：“WeWork走上了一条Lyft走过的老路——如果一家公司巨额亏损，披露做得很糟糕，但又非常傲慢，接下来会发生什么？”华莱士还指出，“巨额的亏损、糟糕的披露、明显的傲慢”，这“致命三板斧”，是今年失败的IPO共同的致命伤。

包括阿加瓦尔在内的很多华尔街专家都认为，很多私人市场投资人对这些“独角兽”公司，错就错在“是我给你自由过了火”。她认为，接下来，投资者将会密切关注这些私人公司的商业计划和亏损情况。曼哈顿风投伙伴公司的研究总监桑斯什·拉奥也表示，投资者现在已经变得非常谨慎了，特别是在Uber和Lyft被“捧得越高摔得越惨”之后。“现在，投资者开始坐下来一条条地看文件了，而不是只关注收入。”

专家们表示，在吸取软银等公司的教训后（软银于今年1月向WeWork注资数十亿美元，虽然WeWork当时还处于巨额亏损），现在的很多投资者在向这些“不惜一切代价增长”的公司投资前，应该都会三思而后行了。

史密斯表示：“市场起着大浪淘沙的作用，不过我认为，目前的问题是，由风投注资的很多这一类的公司，目前都是不以盈利为导向的，而他们却被允许这样经营。”

后期投资的风险

有些专家认为，随着企业在私人市场上的增长，过度的资本投资使得这些企业的后期融资膨胀到了不合理的水平，也就是史密斯所谓的“过度孵化”。

2019年，WeWork的最后一轮私募融资是由软银注资的50亿美元，这笔融资也将WeWork的估值抬高到了470亿美元。不过考虑到该公司的烧钱率（去年WeWork的开支出收入分别是19亿美元和18亿美元）和其他一些问题，公开市场投资者心里对这个估值越来越没底，同时也不愿意认可这个估值。在史密斯看来，这是一次“期待已久的‘对账’的过程。”

这些对私人投资者又意味着什么？专家表示，有了这些前车之鉴，很多私人市场投资者从此或许将谨慎参与企业的后期融资。

拉奥表示：“我认为，私人投资者将意识到，IPO将不会再出现那种大的起伏，没有人可以保证上市一定能够赚钱。因为有些人是后期才投资的，他们既不会有很长的时间展望，也不应该认为自己会通过上市大赚一笔……不过我认为，现在后期几轮的投资者应该会变得更谨慎。他们会意识到，他们的退出策略未必会有丰厚的回报，或者回报可能会很有限。因此，他们要么得继续等待，要么就要确保公司有一个坚实的商业模式，能够经得起公开市场的严密审查。”

全球性投资机构Cambridge Associates的常务董事吉尔·肖认为，投资者要想避免这种“后期估值陷阱”，就要做到更加自律，尽量开展早期投资。

他对《财富》杂志表示：“后期的风险投资的成本是极其高昂的。我认为，大量资本涌入后期投资，实际上给早期投资者带来了好处，因为他们有了另一个退出的机会，因为这些公司会保持私有化更长的时间。所以我们看到的是，一些公司在IPO之前，后期投资者入场时，很多早期投资者完全卖掉了股份，拿钱走人了。他们没有坐等IPO，所以就算IPO估值并没有高于前一轮的估值，对他们也没有什么影响。”

此外他还建议，私人投资者可以与一些有能力鉴别早期投资良机的经理人合作，以避免在一些即将IPO的企业身上赔钱。（就像WeWork的案例，虽然WeWork的上市文件中写明，如果该公司的IPO表现不佳，WeWork将向软银额外提供价值4亿美元的股份。可只要它上市，软银就不可避免地会赔钱。）

资本干涸的风险

根据Preqin公司近期的一项调查，有74%的受访投资者认为，我们正处于当前一个股权投资周期的顶峰。咨询公司麦肯锡的2018年度私人市场年度评估报告显示，去年约有7780亿美元的新增资本流入了私人市场。该报告还指出，2018年，所谓的“超大规模”融资（指规模超过10亿美元）达到了25次，占所有风投交易量的25%以上。另据PitchBook公司和全美风险投资协会（National Venture Capital Association）今年1月发布的数据，2018年，美国的风险投资总额约为1310亿美元，达到了2000年以来的最高水平。

在复兴资本的负责人史密斯看来，私人市场投资早就应该回归到稍低一些的水平了。

史密斯表示：“一切都是市场的周期率在起作用，资本会向有回报的地方流动和集中。目前，私人市场上集中了大量资本。这些资本会逐渐退出私人市场，当这种情况发生时，将会带来更多的挑战。这次是公开市场历史上持续时间较长的投资周期之一，也是我见过的私人投资领域规模最大的一轮周期。”

在2019年IPO规模最大的一些企业中，有几家公司的股价已经比发行价下跌了20%以上。面对这种情况，私人投资者也很有可能转向别处寻找回报。

根据Cambridge Associates在2019年第一季度发布的数据，过去10年间，美国的风投增值回报率事实上还稍逊于标普500指数。Cambridge Associates的常务董事吉尔·肖指出，这主要是由于公开市场的波动性要比私募界强烈得多（当然市场的恢复也是惊人的）。同时他也表示，由于大型基金的投资回报率甚至难以跑赢公开市场，“我们很可能会看到投资的全面收紧。”

“对于私募机构和私人市场上的其他公司……特别是共同基金，它们负有更大的信托责任。总的来说，这将影响到私人市场和公开市场上的估值。”阿加瓦尔对《财富》杂志表示。

“不惜价代增长”模式难以为继

下一步，很多私人投资者可能会重新审视他们的投资战略。与此同时，很多公司将变得更加自律，制订长期化的战略，确保自己只投资那些成熟的公司。

黑石集团的首席执行官苏世民最近在接受CNBC采访时表示：“有些2019年IPO的公司，是不成熟的公司。”

在拉奥看来，作为需要拉到融资的企业，未来要想持续发展，就必须满足一些标准，尤其是在你已经有了很高的估值，而且你的商业模式还不成熟的情况下。

拉奥表示：“你至少要有一条清晰的盈利路线图。如果公司私有化经营很长时间了，又有很高的估值，那么你至少要有一个运转良好、充分成熟的商业模式。我认为大家也都认识到了这个大问题——你不能一上来就要求大家对你的估值跟你自己一样。”

而像WeWork、Uber和Lyft这种“不惜一切代价增长”的公司，也打破了高估值的大公司不可能在公开市场上失败的幻觉。

复兴资本的负责人史密斯表示：“以前，上市公司的IPO估值都要高于私人融资估值，因为公开市场的流动性本身也是有价值的。现在我担心的是，这种现象将反噬到私人市场，给私人市场造成一些寒意。”近期几次IPO的失败，对一些私人投资者的内部收益率也造成了一定影响，在此背景下，有些投资者很可能会重新考虑该如何重新配置资本。

拉奥也表示：“所有这一切的最终结果，是市场的合理化，估值将变得更合理。现在，公开市场实际上给私人市场上了一课，那就是你不能把任何东西强加给我们，你必须证明你自己。”（财富中文网）

译者：朴成奎

From $47 billion to $10 billion—potentially one of the largest valuation drops in 2019. As much-criticized WeWork struggled (and ultimately failed) to IPO at a heavy discount, many companies coming to market this year have been having similar problems. Namely, there’s been a huge disparity between private and public valuations for many companies, and some in the private market are growing skeptical.

To be sure, there have been many notable successes (à la Zoom Video Communications, Datadog, Pinterest, to name a few) to debut this year. But 2019’s IPOs also brought us big flops like Lyft, Uber, and Slack—all three of which are down at least 20% from their debut prices. SmileDirectClub, one of the latest massive unicorns to debut, also disappointed investors in the public markets, trading down some 28% on only its first day, and fitness company Peloton Interactive closed over 11% on its first day. With the We Company throwing in the towel on their IPO before year’s end, investors and analysts are expressing similar anxiety: the private markets and the public markets are largely at odds this year, and private investors are due to lose cash.

“I think that it will impact the valuations in the private markets also—the euphoria that has been there will [be] cut back,” says Reena Aggarwal, professor of finance and director of the Georgetown Center for Financial Markets and Policy at Georgetown University.

The abundance of capital floating in the private markets this year has been feeding many companies that those like Kathleen Smith, principal at Renaissance Capital, a provider of institutional research and IPO ETFs, deem bloated. She claims this private funding has “been able to incubate companies” without too much pushback on important things like cash burn or plans for profitability. But this might be changing.

“This growth at all costs only works in the cheap money era,” Smith tells Fortune, referring to the excess capital in the private markets. “The worry is, does it dry up capital for other companies?”

Funds like SoftBank’s Vision Fund (which notably invested in Uber and WeWork) are in the hot seat. To Smith, case studies like WeWork (what she calls a “cautionary tale”) show a broader problem that investors will have to come to terms with.

“WeWork is a liquidity scare for the private markets—how is it possible a company funded with $12 billion of funding and a possible valuation of $47 billion could not get done in the public markets? It has to be a worry for any of these [private] portfolios,” Smith says. “It’s a wakeup call if you’re in the private market—they must be studying every name they have now.”

But what might 2019’s failures teach the private markets?

The perils of lax due diligence

One thing some on the Street suggest was missing from 2019 IPOs was scrutiny—scrutiny of private companies with massive losses, lofty aspirations (think Peloton’s S-1 line “Peloton sells happiness” or We’s goal to “elevate the world’s consciousness”), and vague plans for profitability.

“WeWork is following a path that was blazed by Lyft—what happens when you have huge losses and crappy disclosure and real arrogance,” says Rett Wallace, CEO and founder of Triton, a firm that focuses on evaluating new listings. Wallace suggests that this trio—“big losses, crappy disclosure, and meaningful arrogance”—is a “lethal combination” that bad IPOs had in common this year.

Indeed, those like Aggarwal believe many of these unicorns were “given a little bit of a free hand.” She maintains investors are going to be keeping a closer eye on private companies’ business plans and losses—and Santosh Rao, head of research at Manhattan Venture Partners, suggests that, especially after Uber’s and Lyft’s “hype and then bust,” investors have become very cautious. “Now they’re reading the fine print, they’re not just looking at the revenues,” he says.

In light of those like SoftBank (who poured billions into WeWork as recently as January while the company was sustaining huge losses), experts suggest many private investors will pause before funding more of these growth-at-all-costs companies.

“The market is distinguishing the good from the bad, but I think the issue is that there’s too many of these companies that have been in venture portfolios that have been permitted to operate without a bottom line orientation,” Smith says.

The danger of late stage investing

As companies grow in the private market, some experts believe the excess capital floating around has made companies’ late-stage private rounds swell to unreasonable levels—or, for Smith, to “incubate.”

In 2019 terms, WeWork’s last private round, funded by SoftBank to the tune of around $5 billion, marked the coworking giant up to roughly a $47 billion valuation. But as has been clear, examining the company’s cash burn ($1.9 billion burned on $1.8 billion revenue last year), as well as other problems, is making public investors increasingly anxious—and unwilling—to validate the private markets’ valuation; which, to Smith, is “the long-awaited reconciliation.”

So what does this mean for private investors? Experts suggest many in the private markets may be reticent to get in on companies' later funding rounds.

“I think [private investors are] going to realize that there’s not going to be that big bump that you get at the IPO, there’s no guarantee,” Rao says. “Because some people come in late, either they should have a very long time horizon, or they think they’re going to get a big pop at the IPO, … but I think now you’ll see that the incremental investor in the later rounds will be more cautious, will know that the exits may not be rewarding, or the upside may be limited when they go out, so they’ll have to either wait or make sure that the company has a solid business model [and] that it can withstand the scrutiny of the public market that is going to be very intense.”

One way Jill Shaw, managing director at global investment firm Cambridge Associates, suggests investors avoid this drop is to be disciplined and get in early.

“Late-stage venture capital is incredibly expensive,” Shaw tells Fortune. “I think it’s actually the phenomenon of all this money pouring in to late-stage is actually a benefit to the early-stage investors because it’s another exit opportunity [because] companies are staying private longer—so what we see is, a lot of these early-stage investors are either selling out completely or taking money off the table when you have some of these pre-IPO, late-stage investors coming in. They’re not waiting for the IPO, and they’re not necessarily hurt if the IPO doesn’t price at a higher valuation than the prior round.”

Shaw recommends private investors partner with savvy managers with proven ability to identify good early-stage investments to avoid losing cash in pre-IPO companies (like SoftBank inevitably will if We ever goes public, although some fine print in We’s S-1 could provide SoftBank with $400 million worth of additional shares if the IPO debuts poorly).

(Certain) capital may dry up

According to a recent Preqin survey, 74% of surveyed investors believe we are at the peak of the equity market cycle. In fact, according to consulting company McKinsey & Company’s private markets annual review for 2018, some $778 billion of new capital flowed in to the private markets last year. According to the report, so-called “supersize” funding rounds (those over $1 billion) in venture capital funding reached 25 in 2018—or over 25% of all venture capital deal volume. Investment from venture capital firms also hit their highest levels since 2000, injecting roughly $131 billion into deals last year, according to data published by PitchBook and the National Venture Capital Association in January.

And to Renaissance Capital’s Smith, private market capital may be overdue for a return to lower levels.

“Everything is always about markets going in cycles,” Smith says. “Capital contracts [and] goes to the areas where the returns are. There’s been a lot of capital in the private market—the capital will recede from the private market, and when it does, it will cause a lot more challenges. This is one of the longer cycles ever in the public market, and the biggest cycle in private spending I’ve ever seen.”

With some of 2019’s biggest IPOs off at least 20% from their initial prices, private investors may be turning elsewhere to get better returns.

According to data from Cambridge Associates from the 1st quarter of 2019, U.S. venture capital value-add returns over the past 10 years have actually trailed returns for the S&P 500. Cambridge Associate’s Shaw suggests this return discrepancy has more to do with the dramatic swings in the public market (and more dramatic recovery) than private equity, but concedes that “we’re probably going to be seeing narrowing across the board” as larger funds’ investments have struggled to even beat the public markets at all.

“For the private equity firms and others in the private market … especially the mutual funds, the Fidelities of the world, they have a bigger fiduciary responsibility. Broadly, this will impact valuation going forward for both private markets and public markets,” Aggarwal told Fortune.

Growth-at-all-costs companies are a bust

While many private investors will likely be re-examining their strategy moving forward, many firms are maintaining more disciplined, long-term strategies and ensuring they only invest in mature companies.

Mega private equity firm Blackstone’s CEO Stephen Schwarzman told CNBC recently that “some of [2019 IPOs] are immature companies.”

And for Rao, companies moving forward are going to have to meet some criteria before coming to market with huge private price tags and immature business models.

“The least you can do is have a clear path to profitability,” Rao says. “If they’ve been private for so long and you come with such high valuation, the least you can do is have a very good up and running, fully-baked business model. I think that’s the big realization that people have now; you really can’t come here and demand the same [valuation] that you had.”

Growth-at-all-costs companies like WeWork, Uber, and Lyft seem to be starting to shatter the illusion that big, high-valuation companies can’t lose in the public markets.

“It used to be that public offerings were done at a premium to the private rounds, because public liquidity is worth something—but the concern I’ve got is that this will feed itself into the private market and cause a chill in the private market,” Renaissance’s Smith says. And based on how some of these private investors’ internal rate of returns (IRR) have been hurt by public markdowns, some investors may be reconsidering where (and when) they’re allocating capital.

“The net effect of everything is going to be a good rationalization of the market, the valuations are going to get more reasonable, and now the public market is actually teaching the private market that you really can’t just put anything on us,” Rao suggests. “You have to prove yourself.”