alt Hacker NewsOwed a billion dollars in Nvidia stock
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If law was expressed as code then there wouldn't be a debate, the time limit would be explicit.
I'll just say that I'm aware of instances where founders have used "clerical errors" in an attempt to trick departed employees from properly vesting their options.
I don't have any inside info about this case obviously, but it's clear Nvidia would have ample motive to try to claw back whatever they could as mid 1996 was when they made their pivot after the disaster.
Again, not throwing around accusations here, just saying it may not be as cut and dried as "it was just an oops but everyone forgot about it for 30 years."
I don’t understand. How are they owed stock if they didn’t exercise? Options are not shares. They’re a contract to purchase shares.
That’s how the statute of limitations works.
Still massively sucks though. Not quite as bad as the guy who bought two pizzas for 10,000 bitcoin but still a situation that would be impossible to ever get over.
There's a Contracts prof reading this and writing a final exam question right now.
Stupidest grift since Joseph Bates claimed he invented the TPU.
You shouldn't just go for the shares but also apply interest on it as well. They could (if my math is right) technically owe you 50-100k shares of then nvidia shares. Which would be a monstrous payday.
If they exercises the rights would they have HODLd to now anyway prolly not. They might have $1m in SP500 index though or similar.
I'd chip in around $50 for a piece of the settlement :-).
The title is missing an ‘n’. It is “Owned a billion dollars in Nvidia stock”. The author owned a billion dollars of Nvidia stock but did not own another, separate, billion dollars of Nvidia stock.
everyone judging the author but 1) i bet everyone in this forum has at least one bunch of stock from some startup that is going nowhere and they couldn't care less 2) very few people would have the Chutzpa to post such a story here, which was an awesome one to learn.
Imagine being owed that when NVDA went parabolic. What a stressful, crazy waiting game that must've been.
You ought to sue. It's a matter of principle. It's bigger than you.
I am a former lawyer who clerked for 2 different federal judges. This is what I think:
The author should sue Nvidia & try to at least force a settlement. What the F are these lawyers doing? When a billion bucks is what you're trying to legitimately claim, the unpredictability of a trial is going to get them to toss you some millions, which is pocket change to Nvidia. At least go get those millions.
It is possible it doesn't work out, but jeez, I'd definitely take the next step. Go consult some more creative lawyers.
NOPE
I bought a cup of coffee for ~10.5 Bitcoin back in April 2011.
Where did it come from? Well, I was curious how Bitcoin worked, so I set up a little mining rig and let it run at night on my work computer. So, other than my time, which I think I did on work's time, and the power, which I think I used work's power... I saw it as a free cup of coffee.
Honestly, I was just so happy to find a booth at a convention that actually took Bitcoin that I didn't mind the crappy exchange rate.
But anyway, I don't think regret is a particularly useful thing to hold onto. You can regret things you did, and you can regret things you didn't do. Either way, there's nothing you can do about it. It feels like baggage. Hold on to too much of it and you sink. You have to find a way to rise above it and keep moving forward. If you don't, you'll drown.
I say that as someone who learned this lesson the hard way.
I spent 3+ years in a legal battle with an insurance company and their contractor that ultimately cost me more than $500,000. I was right. Period. I had been wronged. Period. The contractor and insurance company both lied and I had ample documentation of them doing so, and doing shoddy work. What I was asking for was completely reasonable. But who cares? That's not how the courts or the legal system work.
What I learned from the process was that most people just get screwed over when they go up against big companies. And it's not even close. I'd guess something like 75% of people who get into a fight with an insurance company end up losing -- and it's probably higher than that if you factor in the people who simply give up. Eventually, you have to decide whether continuing to fight is worth what it's costing you.
There will always be another "I almost caught the fish!" story to tell. Life is long. Learn from the mistakes, let go of the things you can't change, and do your best to keep moving forward.
Some situations just suck. Best not to think about it them too much.
this is like finding your harddrive with 13,000 bitcoin but it's encrypted and you forgot the password
This is literally how easy it was for boomers to make 1Bn USD.
Great story, thanks for sharing.
Thanks for sharing, Eric.
I learned a long time ago that everyone has a story of missed mega-riches in Silicon Valley. I have a few of my own :-)
Author here. I wanted to share this piece of personal and technical history from the early days of 3D graphics. The article covers the meeting on my houseboat with Jensen, Curtis, and Chris in 1993, working on biquadratic texture mapping for the NV1, and how Microsoft’s sudden pivot to triangles in DirectX nearly broke the company before their pivot to the RIVA 128. It also digs into the paperwork anomaly I recently uncovered regarding my Technical Advisory Board options and the vesting schedule. Happy to answer any technical questions about the early 90s VR/graphics scene or the NV1 era!
9,375 × $0.05 = $468.75.
So the dispute is basically over whether NVIDIA incorrectly prevented a guy from buying $468.75 worth of additional founder-era stock, which through NVIDIA's subsequent growth and splits became approximately $1 billion of stock thirty years later.
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tl;dr
OP was not given all of the shares earned at the time decades ago and didn't realize that they should've been payed out, but after engaging in a lawsuit realized that the court would likely not grant the case give the statute of limitations.
Kinda like all the Sony game 'owners' not carefully reasing the legally binding contracts they're always signing realizing that they are not in fact purchasing a gauranteed lifetime access to the game.
> Then, in April 1996 - by which time I’d expatriated to the Kingdom of Tonga
It annoys me every time I read the word expat and its derivatives. You became an immigrant, by emigrating to the Kingdom of Tonga. Only because you are white and rich doesn't change the concept of emigration to warrant a word with less stigma.
Immigration is a tricky subject with many nuances, pretending otherwise i.e. driving the immigration = bad line and calling immigration that affects ourselves or that we don't find objectionable expatriation is disingenuous and hinders good quality discourse about the topic.
Big mistake.
These matters are not purely legal nor purely right and wrong.
They are personal and political too.
This is a fight you should have fought.
It’s meaningless anyway because you spaffed them all away. The shares you had were enough for multi-generational wealth. The only reason you’re mad is because you want more money today to spaff. Had you been given the full amount back then, you’d still have nothing today.
And if both parties intended for it to be vesting over four years and you both acted in line with that intention, then the written contract has been superseded by your actions.
Eg You’ve worked there for 10 years, the contract you signed says you get paid 100k but you’ve both since sent letters agreeing to 150k and they’ve been paying you 150k the whole time. Would you accept them taking back 500k because of the original contract? Of course not, because you’ve both agreed to accept the new terms through your actions.
Ok, my 2 cents, I dont see why NVIDIA doesnt just settle with this guy for pennies on the dollar simply for good will. When I do business with people if they have any sort of basis (such as legitimately doing work for me) it's important to me to see them whole. I wouldn't be surprised if this person would have settled for even a 1% valuation ($10M is life altering money to >99% of americans) and it's not like they would have to pay it out, they'd just print the shares. (maybe vest it over 4 years too, har har).
Just my 2c and how I think about business. I get it's not the American Way™ but maybe it should be.
Could someone who understands design explain to me the reason why sites (and Word for that matter) like to load with a TON of blank space on the sides? Is it for mobile? I am on a monitor and it's all just wasted space, even if I bump the font. Is there a reason other than "looks good on a phone"?