Manifold is going to have significant trouble raising a Series A.
1. At a very fundamental level, this is their usage graph. For startups, that's basically flat.

2. Manifold last raised at a 22M valuation on June 10th, 2022. Their current board likely has people from that round who would not like to see another round be raised at a valuation lower than this which is extremely difficult to justify.

3. Manifold has a very high burn rate (~1mm/year in salaries alone)

4. Revenue is flat and just not impressive (~130k/year, not recurring)

5. No clear path to profitability

6. VC funds don't have dry powder like they did when Manifold last raised

7. Angel investors also have less money than when Manifold last raised

@Manifold if you end up going the Republic route does that count as a Series A for the purposes of this question?

https://manifold.markets/market/if-manifold-starts-a-crowdfunding-c

@MattCWilson No.

Are you fundraising?

@long seems they are!

They're hoping to

@long No.

Related:

Will Manifold raise a community round by the end of 2024?

16% chance. Resolves to YES if Manifold initiates a community round by the end of 2024. Resolves to NO **early** if manifold winds down, is acquired, or IPOs before the closing date, without raising a community round. Defining Community Round “A campaign seeking to raise capital in exchange for e…

Seems odd that this hasn't decayed in probability throughout the year

arbitrage:

https://manifold.markets/MatthewSlotkin/will-manifold-markets-raise-a-serie?r=c2F1bG11bm4

@saulmunn theres quite some gap between those two

🥳🥳congrats on getting a grant through the SFF (per https://open.substack.com/pub/manifoldmarkets/p/above-the-fold-create-your-private?r=1eev15&utm_medium=ios&utm_campaign=post)!!

this is making me pretty heavily update against raising a series A, though :)