The glitter around startup IPOs is fading fast. What once felt like innovation now feels like a carefully rehearsed exit strategy. As retail investors keep losing money in the post-listing crash cycle, a growing number of indians believe modern IPOs have transformed from wealth creators into wealth extractors.

And the pattern is becoming impossible to ignore.

1. It Always Begins the Same Way: “We’re Building the Future!”

The pitch deck glows.
The founders sound visionary.
Investors line up.

The burn rate skyrockets.
But behind the inspiring slogans and TED-talk confidence, many startups remain eternal loss-making machines powered only by VC oxygen.

2. Investors Burn Cash. Founders Burn Markets. Profit Burns Last.

The business model? “Scale first, profit later.”

The execution?

• Heavy discounts

• Celebrity ads

• Billion-rupee marketing

• Zero sustainability

• 
  

A company earning ₹1 spends ₹10 to earn it — but no one cares as long as the funding tap flows.

3. Founders Draw Salaries That Would Make Profitable Companies Blush

Even when losses pile up like mountains, the salaries of the top brass magically do not shrink.
The gap between company performance and executive compensation becomes a joke only the insiders laugh at — until the day the money runs out.

4. Then Comes the Turning Point: “Investors Say No More.”

Once the VC glow fades, the board looks at the balance sheet and suddenly panics.
The funding pipeline dries.
Marketing slows.
The runway shortens.

And the founder’s brain lights up with a new idea — not profit, not restructuring, but:

“Let’s go public.”

5. Overnight, Books Miraculously Improve

Critics call it window dressing.
Supporters call it strategic positioning.
Whatever the label, the financials suddenly look cleaner, smoother, shinier than ever before.
The timing is always… convenient.

6. The IPO Is Priced Like the Company Invented electricity Yesterday

The valuation leaps from “struggling startup” to “industry disruptor” in a matter of months.
Prospectus pages balloon with jargon.

Every line screams:
“Buy this now, or regret forever.”

Retail investors fall for the story.
Because who wants to miss “the next big thing”?

7. Listing Day: Everyone Celebrates. Reality Comes Later.

The founder smiles.
The early investors smile.
The bankers smile.
The media smiles.

Retail investors?
They smile too — for now.

Because the party is for the insiders.

8. A Few Months Later… The Graph Looks Like a Cliff.

Share price drops.
Drops more.
Drops again.

And suddenly, “long-term wealth creation” looks like short-term heartbreak.

Meanwhile, insiders who sold at the peak?
They’ve already moved on.

9. Retail Investors Realize They Weren’t Investing — They Were Funding Someone Else’s Exit

This is the part that stings the most.
The people who believe the most often lose the most.
The ones who knew the most often lose the least.

That imbalance isn’t an accident — it’s built into the system.

10. Final Punch: When IPOs Become Escape Routes, It’s Not Entrepreneurship — It’s a Hit-and-Run

Not all IPOs are scams.
Not all founders are opportunists.
Not all startups manipulate appearances.

But the pattern — hype → burn → panic → IPO → crash → exit — is now so common that the public sentiment has turned brutal:

“These aren’t listings. These are liquidation events.”

Until transparency improves, governance tightens, and investor protection strengthens, IPOs will remain what many feel they’ve become:

A high-gloss doorway into someone else’s happily-ever-after.