This seems remarkably muddled:

But the real step the EU can take towards protecting its economy (and with it, its citizens’ wellbeing, optimism and faith in democracy) involves things that are less sexy than building a spaceship, such as finishing the capital markets union that could enable more European tech start-ups to borrow money. The EU has spent the better part of a decade wringing its hands over the absence of European substantial tech companies compared with the US and China. A big reason for this is that it’s simply easier to raise funds in the US because private and public pension funds allocate a greater part of their investments towards venture capital than European pension funds do.

Venture capital isn’t lending money. Therefore you don’t borrow venture capital. The clue’s right there in that second word of the phrase - capital. The writer, Alexander Hurst, should know this:

His memoir, A Stunning Display of Unbelievable Folly, is a modern fable about money and greed; at its center, the story of how he made—and lost—$1.2 million trading “meme stocks” during the chaotic Covid lockdowns of 2020.

But then perhaps the two are in fact connected, not knowing and the performance?

But yes, obviously things get worse:

Europe already exports tech-startup founders to the US rather than keeping them at home – which, according to a US-based French investor – has resulted in French tech in the US being worth far more than French tech in France. For instance, Snowcloud and Datadog, both founded by French entrepreneurs in the US, are many times more valuable than France’s largest unicorns or biggest recent stock market flotation. A situation where the continent is exporting founders, their startups, and the capital that is funding them makes absolutely no sense.

Interesting, perhaps we can find some manner of resolving this conundrum?

This matters because, as Stanford academic and author Mariejte Schaake argues in the FT, we need European tech to embody democratic values. On that front, the EU should feel vindicated that its attempt to regulate disinformation on social media is the correct strategy. ….Whether through enforcement, some new type of regulatory agency or a future ban on X, this is not a fight the EU can back away from because the existence of European democracy itself is at stake.

And there we have it. That Europe is trying to regulate is why the start ups are elsewhere. Europe insists upon regulating using the precautionary principle, it must be shown that there will be no harm before anyone’s actually allowed to do anything. This does not work in fields where - well, it doesn’t work in any field, but - lifecycles are measured in months. This point is not difficult to find. Marc Andreessen, one of the major venture capital investors of our day (note, not lender) has been pointing this out, for free, upon Twitter (or X, to taste).

The Daily Mash did go a little too far insisting that The Guardian is wrong on everything, always. In their economic arguments we do have to admit that the comma placing seems fair enough, often enough.#

Tim Worstall