as trustees of other people's money (OPM), super funds are legally required to be fudicaries and prudent investors. Angels can take a punt as they typically are quite hands-on, or know the domain well enough to take a calculated risk. If a fund manager don't know what they're doing, then they are speculating, not investing.
Whilst people might decry the dearth of risk capital, I'd respectfully point out that there's already a lot of social capital out there in terms of LAMP stacks, FLOSS, long-tail free-to-try PaaS that's already derisked large elements of IT startups (except for marketing). I was reading a private capital market report and whilst crowd-funding (advance purchases) is not taking a big dent, it is on the radar. They had people tapping into multi-million dollar credit cards (admittedly US) as well as well. What is missing is the disposable income of developed countries middleclass to create demand for new goods/services. That is a problem that no super fund can fix. >To my mind, such grass-roots funding for tech investments is >much more likely to avoid massive scams and losses that the >superannuation industry could ill afford. And at the moment the US venture scene is deleveraging as well, having a negative return does that to your limited partners. I've known people who've made investment roadshows in China and managed to pick up seed capital. So there are still pockets out there, just not big pockets (super-angels expect you to validate your market thesis with 10-20k, not millions). So running a lean startup is considered the new norm. which in my mind is globally good (if not individually) as it means takented people from India, etc have a chance to self-boot. Lawrence http://www.linkedin.com/in/drllau On Monday, October 22, 2012 12:40:52 PM UTC+13, Clifford Heath wrote: > > On 22/10/2012, at 9:28 AM, Elias Bizannes <elias.b...@gmail.com<javascript:>> > wrote: > > ... the $1.4 trillion dollars slushing around in the Super funds... > could be what unleases a gold rush for Australia's technology industry > > I agree in general with tight fiscal restraint over super funds. > > What I think could unleash a wave of investment would be > changes in CGT rules around private residences, to be like > the US model. There, the home is not exempt from CGT, > but the CGT can be rolled-over when you move. > > The current rules create a massive distortion in the housing > construction market where people build homes far bigger than > they want to actually live in, ploughing in their private capital > because it can be manipulated to create tax-free growth. As > an investment vehicle it soaks up a lot of cash while returning > very little value. In addition to population growth (the main > driver) it also contributes to house price growth. > > Removing this distortion would open a pool of private capital > from folk who are often at the stage of life where angel investing > would come naturally, and for the more risk-averse, options to > join private investment funding groups. > > To my mind, such grass-roots funding for tech investments is > much more likely to avoid massive scams and losses that the > superannuation industry could ill afford. > > Clifford Heath. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Silicon Beach Australia mailing list. Vist http://siliconbeachaustralia.org for more Forum rules 1) No lurkers! It is expected that you introduce yourself. 2) No jobs postings. You can use http://siliconbeachaustralia.org/jobs To post to this group, send email to silicon-beach-australia@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to silicon-beach-australia+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/silicon-beach-australia?hl=en?hl=en
