Exclusive: Silicon Valley IPO market boom winding down

Last year, many tech IPOs enjoyed soaring valuations in their Wall Street debut, raining cash on the companies and their investors and boosting concerns about another Silicon Valley bubble. Now, the party is winding down, according to data analyzed by Reuters: Five of the 12 U.S.-based tech companies that went public this year, or 42 percent, priced their shares at a valuation below or nearly the same as their private market value, compared to 24 percent of the 29 that went public in 2014. “People are no longer out of their minds with valuations and expectations,” said Adam Marcus, managing partner at OpenView Venture Partners in Boston

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China car services firm Tuhu raises $100 million from Joy Capital, Welkin

Tuhu, a Chinese online platform for automobile services and products, said on Tuesday it raised about $100 million from a group of investors including venture capital firm Joy Capital, looking to expand its distribution network and warehouses. Joy Capital, whose founders include the former head of telecommunications investments at Legend Capital, led the funding round, Tuhu Founder and Chief Executive Min Chen said. Other investors included private equity firm Welkin, leasing company Far East Horizon Ltd and existing Tuhu investors such as Legend Capital and Qiming Venture Partners.

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China’s Airbnb-like Tujia raises $300 million to expand overseas

(Corrects paragraph 4 to clarify The Ascott is investing $50 mln with other investors) HONG KONG (Reuters) – Tujia, a Chinese vacation rental company similar to home rental firm Airbnb Inc, said on Monday it had raised $300 million from a group of investors to expand its business overseas, increase marketing and offer new products. The deal values Tujia at more than $1 billion, the Chinese company added without disclosing the size of the stake the investors bought. Other investors included existing Tujia shareholders and The Ascott Ltd, a serviced residence business owned by Singapore’s CapitaLand Ltd, that is leading a consortium to invest $50 million in Tujia.

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India’s Snapdeal to raise $500 million from Alibaba, SoftBank, Foxconn: sources

By Paul Carsten BEIJING (Reuters) – Indian online marketplace Snapdeal is set to raise $500 million from a group of foreign investors including China's Alibaba Group Holding Ltd, three people familiar with the matter said on Monday. The latest round of support, from investors also including SoftBank Group Corp and Foxconn, the trading name of Hon Hai Precision Industry Co Ltd, would value Snapdeal at more than $5 billion, another person said. The move is a show of faith from three of the world's biggest technology companies in fast-growing Snapdeal, which in October secured a $627 million investment from SoftBank, itself an early backer of Alibaba.

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Texan charged in first bitcoin securities fraud Ponzi case

By Jonathan Stempel NEW YORK (Reuters) – A Texas man who operated Bitcoin Savings and Trust was charged on Thursday with bilking his investors, in what prosecutors called the first federal criminal securities fraud case arising from a bitcoin-related Ponzi scheme. Trendon Shavers, 32, of McKinney, Texas, was charged with misappropriating about 146,000 of the 764,000 bitcoin, then worth more than $4.5 million, that he raised from September 2011 to September 2012 by promising investors “absurdly high” interest rates, U.S.

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