Others point to signs of bubbliness. For instance, some start-up firms are dangling multi-million-dollar pay packages in order to tempt star programmers from Google, Microsoft and other big companies. They are chasing scarce skills when the broader technology industry is on a roll. The NASDAQ index may be far below the heights of March 2000, but it has bounced back from the global downturn; and the Federal Reserve Bank of San Franciscos Tech Pulse Index, which measures the vibrancy of Americas tech industry, is near its peak of 11 years ago .
There are also signs of irrational exuberance among some investors. Color, a photo-sharing and social-networking start-up, has been reportedly valued at around $100m by venture firms, even though it has an untested product in a crowded market. Competition among angel investors has helped drive up valuations of social-media start-ups by more than 50% in the past 12 months. Financiers are sometimes skimping on due diligence in the scramble to win deals. In China, too, the purported worth of young firms has risen breathtakingly fastto an average of $15m-20m in first-round venture financings, which is expensive even by Silicon Valleys standards.
The danger in all this is that investors lose sight of the risks to the value of internet companies. These are greatest in China. Competition there is intense and users are fickle. Moreover, Chinese firms must wrestle with thorny regulatory and political issues. The government has yet to shut down a listed web company and firms are usually masters of self-censorship. But any move against them could have broad repercussions for all Chinese internet stocks.
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