Yep, startup prices are falling

Data shows that the value of later-stage startups is declining.

The scale of the contraction is worth noting, even though this market movement isn't a surprise. According to the Financial Times, the prices of companies on the Forge Global platform had fallen in February and March compared with the fourth quarter of last year.

Money, markets and startups are explored by the Exchange.

You can get The Exchange newsletter every Saturday.

The general price movement for late-stage unicorns has been confirmed by other data.

Secondary data should not be used to set public market prices. Before it listed last year, it was valued at more than $100 billion on secondary markets. The company's value is about $38.6 billion, a sharp discount from the 12 figures it once commanded.

That caveat aside, a decline of a fifth is material, and provides more evidence that what Instacart went through earlier this year could prove to be more harbinger of what’s to come than a one-off datapoint.

How big is a 20% haircut?

The data from Carta was looked into by TechCrunch in March. The company has a lot of data from startup actively raising money. Shrinking round sizes and valuations were shown in its data.

The average deal size at the Series C mark in January and February was off 23% compared to the last two months of the previous year, and valuations fell 47% on average. We will get updated data from Carta this week, if possible, to provide a clearer picture of Q1.