One of the richest and least-known people in the Silicon Valley is Andreas Bechtolsheim, who was my business partner and investor for my company Prophet. I was sad to see a prominent story in this morning’s paper about how he was caught trying to hide a $415,726 profit from insider trading. He’s had to pay a financial penalty and is disallowed from serving on a public company for five years.
It’s important to put this into perspective. I did the math, and while $415,726 is a big figure to folks like you and me, proportionately speaking, it is $7.51 to Andy. I’m not trying to be cute; that’s the real figure. So, he’s permanently damaged his otherwise spotless reputation over an amount of money which, to you or me, is equal to a beverage from a good coffee shop.
