These numbers explain why some shareholders (especially the VCs) are so hot to take the company public. This isn’t about Google’s setting off a new boom in tech IPOs–that’s just hype, designed to lure more suckers into the game and run up prices. The game here is for people to create windfall gains for themselves before the IPO market tanks again. Is going public in the company’s long-term interest? Google’s two founders (indicated gain: $2.8 billion each) seem dubious–and rightly so. But as the numbers show, going public is in current shareholders’ short-term interest. And on Wall Street, short term is what it’s all about.
