HACKER Q&A
📣 amrrs

What do HN users feel about the downfall of tech stocks?


There are lot of speculations around economic crisis given tech stocks are in down fall and some companies started talking about reduced hiring ( FB, Uber).


  👤 kylehotchkiss Accepted Answer ✓
There’s just a lot going on in the world right now - Russia’s invasion in one corner, china’s lockdowns in the other. Both hit pretty much as the emergency phase of the pandemic ended which is making recovery even harder. As a side effect of both, we have rising fuel prices and probably worse supply chain crunches coming our way. Don’t forget rate hikes and all the news about water shortages in the southwest!

I’m hoping later this year we start to get some breaks in the news cycles and see market recovery. Sentiment matters. Apple will still continue to innovate, Cloudflare’s launched a bunch of cool new stuff this week, lots of cool EV companies in the pipeline. The market will reflect this all sometime hopefully soon!


👤 matt_s
Over last 6 months, NASDAQ is down ~28%, S&P 500 is down ~15%. Its not just tech stocks.

Typical knee-jerk reactions by publicly traded companies is to restrict hiring, restrict admin spending and possibly have layoffs. There are some companies posting positive quarterly results and their stock still moves down so this downturn isn't really something a company can do anything about. If employees are sitting on a bunch of grants/options there is a chance they might be worthless depending on how they're awarded.

I suspect the few trillion dollars pumped into the economy the last couple years is catching up with itself. At end of Q2 if GDP is down/slowed then I think someone will use whatever official wording they use for downfall/recession/slump/correction. And people will go "gee really?!?"


👤 s1artibartfast
Validated. Started to question my sanity seeing PEs sitting over 40, 50, or 80.

That said, having just bought a BA house, I'm mentally preparing to ride a long downswing or stagnation in home value. It will be interesting to see how much inflation softens the blow for real assets.

I'm not aiming to make any tech stock value plays, but watching physical goods manufacturers


👤 codingdave
We've been in a bubble for a long time. So now it pops. Companies that never had a solid business model underlying their work will pop with it. The rest will tighten their belts for a while, and we all will recover over time.

This will be the 3rd time through an industry low point in my career. Most people will get through it. Some will retire, some change industries. As long as society itself does not collapse, we'll all get through it. (And if it does collapse, we'll have bigger fish to fry.)


👤 VirusNewbie
I imagine YC companies (and similar startups) are salivating right now at the thought of RSU packages dropping like rocks.

It is very hard for small startups to offer something comparable to 200k salary and 200k a year in RSUs.

But if those packages are now worth 200/70, maybe a salary of 200k and stock options that might be worth a couple million look more more appealing, especially if someone is tired of a big company.

I have a few friends who have expressed this. They wanted to leave the bigcos, but felt like they couldn't because of the money they'd be walking away from. Now they said they're looking at fun startups since their Bigco stock grant is worth so much less.


👤 donsupreme
Honestly, overall comp for both SWE and DS especially has been inflated by the FAANG. Deep down we all know $400-600K overall comp is not sustainable, for the same amount of work that people did just a decade ago for $150-250K range.

👤 spicyusername
I'm more concerned about the housing market than the stock market.

The drop in inflated securities prices seems like its just the business cycle doing its thing. Take a look at the Wall St. Cheat Sheet. We're still at the Denial / Panic phase, but we'll get to the Anger / Depression phase in time.

Its a bit surprising to me there hasn't been _more_ tumult, given all that has been happening in the world the past few years.


👤 silisili
Mixed feelings. It was a long time coming - the market was obviously way overvalued given historical trends. In that regard, I'm happy to return to some normalcy.

On the other hand, this usually ends in a lot of layoffs, and I'm not exactly thrilled at that prospect.


👤 kixiQu
Irritated, because my comp was set a long time ago and involves RSUs?

Otherwise, my feeling is that this entire industry is ridiculously bubbly and "the stock market is just a graph of rich guys' feelings", money isn't real, etc. etc.


👤 PaulHoule
Stocks go up, stocks go down.

👤 TrackerFF
Higher interest rates would mean less risky investments, so let's see how the most debt-fueled startups are going to navigate the next rounds.

👤 seydor
i dont know if it means anything - the tech didnt go away

what happened was tech was wildly profitable and became overvalued. tons of capital is invested in US tech stocks thats why compensations are through the roof. but the stock inflation did not reflect technological progress, but rather too much capital, both printed us dollars and foreign capital (europe has no tech sector worth investing in sadly). Companies seemed to care more about making bank from an IPO than making actual money. That is going to change now, and we ll have to see some actual moneymaking tech.

It's also been at least 10 years now that HN is all about bloated frameworks that make tech dumb-proof but not more capable. i hope this will end now as well


👤 s1artibartfast
As an aside, it'll be interesting if the people pushing for taxing unrealized gains well now push for tax deductions on unrealized losses.

Less sarcastically, I think it means this tax proposal is DOA


👤 mateo411
I feel poorer.

👤 kradeelav
We're entering an almost-certain recession. It's just common sense that the more fragile/risky/not tied to physical products stocks would be hit hard.

👤 zucked
Good riddance. If you survived on cheap cash burn and never bothered to shore up the fundamentals, well, the free ride is over now, kiddos.

👤 rootsudo
Great buying opportunity - good companies like MSFT and Apple are great buys - but with Caravana in the red 93% and firing so much staff, it may be the time where the market corrects and the auto note loan business is going to lead to alot of underwater cars. Then housing, with same, zillow and open door signalled this a month or two ago - and the Fed hiking up the interest rate, and bitcoin hitting 28k.

Fun times and it'd be a Fun Friday Close.


👤 llampx
I know that depression callers are a dime a dozen, but I follow someone who's been extremely prescient from the 2020 correction, their team was calling for 4000+ as the S&P was hitting 2200, and they are calling for a big bear market once we hit 5500. So the tech stock sculling didn't take them by surprise but they're looking for a big correction starting fairly soon.

👤 sparky_
Depressed, scared and yet optimistic over the long (5+ year) term.

👤 t-3
Glad the only tech stock I'm holding is Intel.

👤 nunez
My retirement accounts love the sale!

👤 pigtailgirl
doubled down on cloudflare at $150 - three guesses how I feel -

👤 khaledh
It's happening.