I wrote this post in 2009. My kids are all grown now, but the memories are priceless.

I typically blog about technology product management, private equity, venture capital or monetizing social media. Today I’d like to write about something a little more holiday-centric — the Santa Hat Believer’s Club.

I have loved the Christmas season since I was a child. Even as I approach the ripe age of 50 it is my favorite time of the year. I remember to this day almost every Christmas from when I was a child. My parents had a set of wonderful holiday traditions…

There’s a reason why I haven’t published anything in a year- check out why at the end of this post.

The Software Equity Group has published their Q320 SaaS Public Market Update. You can download the entire report here. SaaS Valuations have reached record highs, in spite of the Covid-19 crisis.

SaaS Q3 2020 Valuation Context

Covid-19 has undoubtedly been a worldwide crisis:

If you lose your keys you can call a locksmith to open your door or car. There are 26,000 locksmiths in the U.S., so clearly there is a need for this type of service. If you lose the private keys to your crypto wallet you are out of luck. Bitcoin, as well as all other major cryptocurrencies that came after it, is built upon public-key cryptography, a cryptographic system that uses pairs of keys: public keys, which are publicly known and essential for identification, and private keys, which are kept secret and are used for authentication and encryption.

On August 19, 2019 the SOHO Forum hosted a lively Oxford-style debate between George Selgin and Saifedean Ammous. Selgin is the Director of the Cato Institute’s Center for Monetary and Financial Alternatives, where he is the editor-in-chief of the Center’s blog, Alt-M, Professor Emeritus of economics at the Terry College of Business at the University of Georgia, and an associate editor of Econ Journal Watch. Ammous is an associate professor of economics at Adnan Kassar School of Business and a foreign member of the Center on Capitalism and Society at Columbia University. …

The Software Equity Group has published their third quarter 2019 SaaS M&A update. You can download the entire report here (free, email registration required). As usual it contains a ton of valuable information.

Highlights

• For the first time, M&A deal volume for the overall software industry (including SaaS, on-premise license model software, internet, and mobile deals) eclipsed 700 transactions in 3Q19.
• Specific to the SaaS M&A market, deal volume reached a historical high of 314 SaaS transactions in 3Q19, a 24.6% YoY increase from 3Q18’s 252 transactions. Annual deal volume is expected to reach approximately 1,100–1,200 deals by end of 2019.
• …

I am a student of history and when it comes to the ups and down of the tech market I recall the economist Edmund Burke’s famous quote “Those who don’t know history are doomed to repeat it” Over the past few weeks I have come across a number of articles that imply that we are headed for another tech market meltdown. I thought I would share them so you could draw your own conclusions.

A good analysis about the performance of Unicorn IPOs in 2019 including Lyft, Pinterest, Zoom, Uber, Fiverr, Slack & Peleton

The saga of WeWork’s IPO withdrawal…

Eleven years ago this week in 2008 Sequoia published their infamous RIP Good Times presentation that presaged the challenges the tech market would face in the coming years. With a potential recession looming in 2020 is it possible that their advice could be relevant again?

The Economy Moves in Cycles

The business cycle is an inescapable truth of the American economy: