alt Hacker NewsIsn't venture capital just playing along too, though? They also benefit from all the myth making and hype storms, even if they are technically getting defrauded while funding it.
They could actually audit the companies they invest in, and go after the frauds. The Nikola example is a great one--if anyone had looked carefully behind the marketing the fraud should have been obvious. But by and large they don't, really. Seems to be a tacit endorsement of the behavior.
ZIRP made it unprofitable to chase down fraud; money was too cheap and attention too scarce. We’ve been in a tightening cycle for a while now, but many still held out hope for another drop in interest rates. Now that rates are going crazy, I suspect we’ll see a shift to much tighter vetting and ongoing monitoring.