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Not only was Acorns' SPAC IPO felled like an oak but it'll pay a fat termination fee for release of liability

The Irvine, Calif., robo-advisor is blaming 'market conditions' but it's the one paying the penalty fee and praising its punisher

Author Brooke Southall January 19, 2022 at 5:34 AM
Admin:
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Noah Kerner: 'Acorns will be on the right side of history. We are not a grow-at-all-costs company.'

Brian Murphy

Brian Murphy

January 19, 2022 — 8:42 PM
Unfortunate turn of events for Acorns, but anyone with experience in the industry could see how precarious the whole SPAC boon-doggle was. SPACs were built on the idea of incentivizing private companies to go public through an alternative route (reverse merger). That incentive hits home to those companies that really aren't ready for the public markets - including Acorns, Lemonade, Money Lion, etc. The only way it works is for more naive (greedy?) investors to jump on the train and hold through the reverse merger. That worked for a few early SPACs, but it eventually became clear that many of these emperors had no clothes...and that's where we now sit, with a bunch of busted SPACs and shareholders scratching their heads on how such a vibrant company could be down 80% from its high.

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