Telegram Chooses Independence

A story about how Telegram maintains its independence through donations and debt financing while rejecting major investment offers.

"Telegram basically doesn't make money. They've had over $1 billion in donations from users, which helps keep it going. It's 30 people and then server costs, so there's burn but it's not like running a 3,000 or 30,000 person company.

He raised a $1 billion debt bond, which is basically like a pre-IPO coupon. He had offers to sell 10% at a $30 billion valuation - he turned it down. Then they came back and said we'll buy 10% at a $40 billion valuation, so $4 billion - he turned it down. He said 'I don't want to sell any equity, I'm scared of what an investor will do.'

He did a crypto token back when crypto was really hot and raised over $1 billion for their crypto coin, but then the SEC came after him saying 'this was basically like you were selling equity, you called it a token and utility but this is equity.' He had to return a bunch of money and that token project never got off the ground. The minimum investment at the time was $20 million."