WeWork just dropped the paperwork for its IPO. That means, we now have a chance to take a closer look at the company's finances, including which investors own the largest stakes. The We Company, as WeWork's corporate parent is known, has many more private investors than its new S-1 filing reveals and some of them have already cashed out and done well. Insiders have sold billions of dollars of We Co. stock in so-called secondary transactions — in which shareholders privately sell their stock directly to investors — according to Pitchbook, the database that tracks such records. For instance, shareholders sold $1.3 billion to Softbank in August, 2017, in addition to the $1.7 billion Softbank spent on shares issued by the company. In January, Softbank bought another $1 billion of shares from existing shareholders, as well, Pitchbook says. The company hasn't yet disclosed the price it plans to sell shares. So it's not possible to know (or even guess) how much each person's stake is worth at this time. Still, in 2017, when WeWork raised $1.7 billion (and had raised $3.4 billion to date) which valued the company at $21 billion, investors bought in at $57.90 per share, according to Pitchbook. So, just for the sheer fun of it, we calculated the value of all classes of shares at $58. We'll learn the true value of each stake when the company prices its shares right before they begin to trade, and we'll update this article at that time.
Business Insider has analysed The We Company’s S-1 filing to determine who has skin in the game. Predictably, Adam Neumann has plenty albeit spread across a complex web of companies, which ensures he has control of the votes and at $58 a share, a stake worth $6.7bn. Co-founder Miguel McKelvey stake is estimated to be worth $679.8m and other WeWork executives are listed . SoftBank’s stake is worth more than $6.6bn but its Class A shares have reduced voting power. Benchmark Capital’s holding is worth nearly $1.9bn. JPMorgan’s private equity funds hold nearly $1.1bn. According to Pitchbook, there are 32 other investors including T Rowe Price, Goldman Sachs and real estate tycoon Mortimer Zucjerman with stakes too small to require disclosing in the documents.