heywood on 17/9/2023 at 20:48
Thanks for that link. The connections are interesting.
I read that Unity only makes about 1/3 of their revenue from the engine and assets store, and more than half from ads and in-app purchases. But if they weren't developer friendly, they wouldn't have a big platform to sell ads from. It's looking like they have an unsustainable business model and don't know how to fix it. The video mentioned Twitter and Reddit, and I think they have the same problem.
(
https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1810806/000119312520227862/d908875ds1.htm) https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1810806/000119312520227862/d908875ds1.htm
Yakoob on 17/9/2023 at 21:39
Just to dispel this myth since I still keep this being repeated - he sells shares all the time, and he sold a whopping 2k out of millions he still owns. This is a non-issue.
Quote Posted by heywood
It's looking like they have an unsustainable business model and don't know how to fix it. The video mentioned Twitter and Reddit, and I think they have the same problem.
I'm not savvy enough to go through all their balance sheets but from what I gather reading about others' breakdowns, most of their expenses were from RnD and acquiring other companies. So they could very well be profitable if they didn't reinvest so much on expansion and growth.
Starker on 18/9/2023 at 01:00
Quote Posted by Yakoob
Just to dispel this myth since I still keep this being repeated - he sells shares all the time, and he sold a whopping 2k out of millions he still owns. This is a non-issue.
This is just it, why did they start selling off their shares of the company they were running at roughly the same time? I mean, if it was just this one guy, sure I'd give him the benefit of a doubt, but so many of them? And some of the guys apparently sold most of their stuff.
The way it looks to me, they knew beforehand what was going to happen and started selling off their shares using the legal loophole of scheduled trading to avoid falling under scrutiny for insider trading: (
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/r/rule-10b5-1.asp)
Why did he sell off only 2k that one time, you ask? Maybe that was the maximum he was allowed to sell under this rule, which establishes the number and frequency you are allowed to buy or sell according to a set formula. Though, I'm no financial expert, so can't really make any strong statements in that regard.
Yakoob on 18/9/2023 at 02:57
I looked up the 2nd guy in the Kotaku article, Tomer Bar-Zeev, who sold 37,500 shares, but apparently owns 6,012,105 (if (
https://www.gurufocus.com/insider/223283/tomer-bar-zeev) this source can be trusted). That's less than 1% of all the shares he owns.
"Let's keep 99% of our shares before we tank the whole company" does not really sound like some grand conspiracy.
I'm not gonna go through all of them, but if they're all at this level, I really don't see this as anything more than ragebait.
edit: also not finance expert, so if anyone here understands stock trading at this level and wants to chime in, would love to hear some educated opinions :)
Starker on 18/9/2023 at 04:42
Quote Posted by Yakoob
I looked up the 2nd guy in the Kotaku article, Tomer Bar-Zeev, who sold 37,500 shares, but apparently owns 6,012,105 (if (
https://www.gurufocus.com/insider/223283/tomer-bar-zeev) this source can be trusted). That's less than 1% of all the shares he owns.
"Let's keep 99% of our shares before we tank the whole company" does not really sound like some grand conspiracy.
Sure, he only sold off 37,500 shares during that one day, but during the months leading up to that day, he sold off about 600k shares, nearly a third of what he owned as of March 31st this year, if this source can be trusted: (
https://fintel.io/n/bar-zeev-tomer)
Also, Egon Durban, one of the board members, apparently disclosed a couple of days ago that he had sold off all of his Unity stock of 250k shares: (
https://fintel.io/n/durban-egon)
If my math is not off, that's 100% of all the shares he owned.
Pyrian on 18/9/2023 at 06:35
Quote Posted by Starker
Sure, he only sold off 37,500 shares during that one day, but during the months leading up to that day, he sold off about 600k shares, nearly a third of what he owned as of March 31st this year, if this source can be trusted: (
https://fintel.io/n/bar-zeev-tomer)
What's up with the 4.5m shares that appear and then vanish? Anyway, he's only
had those shares for less than a year, if I read this right all the trades were pre-scheduled, looks like a few percent a month since his shares vested. Not exactly a show of confidence in the future of the company, but hardly a "sell all just before" sort of thing, either.
Quote Posted by Starker
Also, Egon Durban, one of the board members, apparently disclosed a couple of days ago that he had sold off all of his Unity stock of 250k shares:(
https://fintel.io/n/durban-egon)
I like how you say "disclosed a couple of days ago" as if to deliberately obscure that he sold out of the company a few days
after the fiasco. :D
Starker on 18/9/2023 at 07:24
I mean, disclosure is the term used for reporting insider trades, from what I gather. But, as I said, not a financial expert so not 100% sure on that.
As for the other stuff, though, it's hardly a conspiracy theory to think that:
1) the big muck-a-mucks had advanced info of the plan, possibly months in advance
2) they knew that when the news of this was eventually going to break, the shares of the company might well tank
3) they used a SEC rule to schedule sell-offs of shares to avoid accusations of insider trading
WingedKagouti on 18/9/2023 at 09:19
Quote Posted by Starker
This is just it, why did they start selling off their shares of the company they were running at roughly the same time? I mean, if it was just this one guy, sure I'd give him the benefit of a doubt, but so many of them? And some of the guys apparently sold most of their stuff.
Executives getting part of their payment in shares isn't just common, it's the standard practice. Executives having a continuous rolling sale of their shares is also standard practice. The main thought process is that this setup incentivizes the executives to work hard to increase the value of the shares, so that both they and investors profit long term.
While the people involved are not good people,
this particular thing isn't scummy, illegal or unethical.
demagogue on 18/9/2023 at 18:07
Pretty epic (
https://twitter.com/unity/status/1703547752205218265) volte-face. This is one for the history books.
Quote Posted by Unity
We have heard you. We apologize for the confusion and angst the runtime fee policy we announced on Tuesday caused. We are listening, talking to our team members, community, customers, and partners, and will be making changes to the policy. We will share an update in a couple of days. Thank you for your honest and critical feedback.
6:13 PM · Sep 17, 2023 · 8.2M Views
Pyrian on 18/9/2023 at 19:23
Quote Posted by Starker
I mean, disclosure is the term used for reporting insider trades...
The link you posted listed the reporting date and the transaction date, both as September 15th, three days post announcement. I don't know where you got the term "disclosure", which is synonymous with reporting date but notably not what your link uses. Regardless, the relevant date in this case is not the disclosure but the transaction. He sold all his shares in three transactions, three days
after the announcement. Doesn't fit your narrative - and you'd've known that, if you paid
any attention to the sources you're citing.
