Unity bosses sold stock days before development fees announcement::Unity executives sold thousands of shares in the weeks leading up to last night’s hugely controversial announcement it …

    • @Szymon@lemmy.ca
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      5010 months ago

      The stock is down 5.5% today. It’s down 6% from a week ago.

      The stock is up 0.5% from a month ago, and up a whopping 32% from 6 months ago.

      It’s down 50% from five years ago.

      What I’m getting at is that this announcement has very little movement on the stock price overall. Unless these bosses were clearing out their inventory thinking this news would kill the company, its possible these sales were normal transactions.

      • gila
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        3610 months ago

        The financial impact of this decision is entirely speculative at this stage. Unity’s next quarterly earnings report won’t be impacted by it. The market is attempting to price in losses that haven’t yet occurred. We won’t know how it affects stock price for awhile

        • @jonne@infosec.pub
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          1210 months ago

          Yeah, an announcement like this is the shit wall street lives for. Short term gain but a long term harm is what they’re all about. That’s why they love layoffs as well. Doesn’t matter that it screws with company morale, short term the company makes more profit!

        • @Szymon@lemmy.ca
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          510 months ago

          The small nosedive the stock price took agrees with your assessment. It’ll get an emotional reaction from some, but decisions like this are made in the interest of the shareholder, not the consumer - this is a calculated move to generate profit. They decided that the losses of people abandoning the product will be outweighed by the profits of this new revenue steam.

      • no surprises
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        2310 months ago

        What I’m getting at is that this announcement has very little movement on the stock price overall.

        Hindsight bias. They didn’t know that before the announcement.

      • @livingcoder@programming.dev
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        110 months ago

        “Normal transaction” after a fundamental change in how all games that use your product are financially responsible by novel, unmeasurable, and unrealistic metrics. No transaction prior to this kind of announcement is “normal” imo.

      • Andy
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        -210 months ago

        Why would executives sell shares of their own company in any case?

        I could imagine selling a handful of shares to finance a big purchase like a house, but otherwise they shouldn’t ever be cashing out while they’re in charge. If they think they’re serving the company, they should be holding onto their shares.

        • @Szymon@lemmy.ca
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          510 months ago

          The flaw is the notion that they serve the company. This is a parasitic class which serves itself above all else.

        • 小莱卡
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          10 months ago

          Stock buybacks, where a company buys its own stock to inflate stock prices and reward shareholders, are reeaally common practices. Obviously, shareholders have to sell stocks to cash out.

    • @atzanteol@sh.itjust.works
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      4510 months ago

      All trading by corporate officers is, by definition, “insider trading”.

      But as long as they did it at the appropriate times (usually windows after earnings calls iirc) and file with the SEC it’s fine.

      • @tory@lemmy.world
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        410 months ago

        We’re gonna tank the company for money, everyone in this room sell all your stock over the next x months.

        X months pass and the last sale of stock happens legally

        Time for that announcement, send it.

        • @atzanteol@sh.itjust.works
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          110 months ago

          Thanks - now that I’ve slept on it I believe the “after earnings call” applies to other non-officers of the company. I remember having some options that I could only exercise during certain times (HR would send us emails when those windows opened/closed).

    • 小莱卡
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      410 months ago

      Has any executive uh ever been prosecuted for insider trading after stock buybacks?

    • Dudewitbow
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      110 months ago

      CEOs and CFOs on occasion have protections against insider trading stuff.

  • @misterundercoat@lemmy.world
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    6910 months ago

    If you’re ever worried that these corporate assholes are never punished for their blatant shady behavior, don’t worry. They have to deal with raised eyebrows which we all know can be super embarrassing.

    • @MisterMcBolt@lemmy.world
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      410 months ago

      I dunno, if a government cares enough to look into this then the corpos might get some VERY sharp slaps on their wrists.

  • @mrsgreenpotato@discuss.tchncs.de
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    5810 months ago

    Installed Godot yesterday and it’s starting to grow on me, I like it. Looking forward to a huge movement of studios over to Godot, which will hopefully speed up the development of Godot through further support. Is there any reliable source of data about which game engines are popular at the moment? I want to see that sweet sweet decline in Unity user base over to Godot.

    • @Fisch@lemmy.ml
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      1310 months ago

      I really love Godot, it’s great. I actually switched to it before I even knew what open source was simply because it’s way nicer to use.

      • @mrsgreenpotato@discuss.tchncs.de
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        310 months ago

        What types of games do you develop? I just started gamedev as a hobbyist earlier this year, so I’m by no means an expert in the field. I’m not into 2D games, I very much prefer 3D. What scares me is that I don’t see that many well made 3D games in Godot out there. It’s mostly 2D. Nonetheless, the engine seems to be capable of doing about the same of what Unity offers. I hope I’ll be able to soon reach the same level of proficiency in Godot and support the growth of 3D community.

        • @Corkyskog@sh.itjust.works
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          110 months ago

          Now I am confused what a game engine even does? I thought it was a type of rendering software, shouldn’t all of them do 3D?

          • @Afiefh@lemmy.world
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            110 months ago

            There is a lot more to a game engine than just graphics, although that’s an important piece of the puzzle.

            Input, sound, physics, networking, collision detection, path finding, scripting…etc are all important parts that are handled by the engine.

    • @waitmarks@lemmy.world
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      3010 months ago

      unfortunately there is a massive loophole that allows them to do this. what they do is set up sell orders at regular intervals (once a month or whatever) for months or years in advance. then when they decide they dont want to sell, they just cancel the order which is totally fine for them to do for some reason. if they do want to sell they just let the order execute and if anyone asks, they set it up a year ago and there is no possibility that the current decision could have influenced them into making that sell order a year ago.

      • @sonnenzeit@feddit.de
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        410 months ago

        I guess it would be best to change the rules so that they cannot trade their company stocks at all while working there and a reasonable period beyond. I think some legislations already restrict floating stock like that but I’m no expert on the matter.

        • @severien@lemmy.world
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          110 months ago

          That would make stocks a form of retirement, not a work compensation.

          How about that you can sell the stocks, with an uncancellable order a year in advance?

          • @sonnenzeit@feddit.de
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            110 months ago

            Good point.

            I guess just having a staggered temporal restriction is fine, don’t need to wait until you retire necessarily. You would still receive a portion of your salary package in the form of classic currency and plenty for a good life too. An example could look like this and I’m obviously making up the percentages and durations here, they would need to be fine tuned:

            • 40% of salary as cash
            • 10% of salary as stocks that can’t be sold within 6 months
            • 10% of salary as stocks that can’t be sold within 12 months
            • 10% of salary as stocks that can’t be sold within 18 months
            • 10% of salary as stocks that can’t be sold within 24 months
            • 10% of salary as stocks that can’t be sold within 30 months
            • 10% of salary as stocks that can’t be sold within 36 months
    • idunnololz
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      10 months ago

      Usually people at a company are not allowed to sell stock except during special windows. For people at the very top it’s restricted even further where they need to essentially plan to buy/sell stock well in advance. Essentially there is a huge delay to any stock decisions. So these sell offs were likely decided far in advance and once locked in cannot be changed.

      For more details read https://www.investopedia.com/terms/r/rule-10b5-1.asp

      • @vivadanang@lemm.ee
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        4310 months ago

        the sale might not have been shady if scheduled, but the timing of the announcement which they have complete control over IS shady as fuck.

      • @ramble81@lemm.ee
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        710 months ago

        So basically it can be “legit” if they schedule the sale for a year out and the announcement for a year and a day…

    • @Damage@feddit.it
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      1410 months ago

      You can regulate the stock market as much as you want but it’s a flawed concept.

  • @dangblingus@lemmy.world
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    1310 months ago

    It’ll be my ignorance, but how are you allowed to own stock in the company you’re on the C-level of? Wouldn’t your direct control of the company, and the ability to buy and sell stock, be seen as insider trading?