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"A few companies (such as ScanScout) were acquired by other private companies, so I include those in the "still alive and doing well" category, since it was not an exit from the investor perspective (no liquidity)"

How common is it for investors not to get liquidity in this situation?

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Acquisitions made primarily with private stock really fall into two buckets:

- Those where the private stock is worth more than cash. It would have been a good bet to get pre-IPO Google stock instead of the same amount in cash.

- Those where the acquiring company stock is equally risky and the acquisition is made as a last-ditch effort (fire sale, consolidate investor portfolio, etc)

To elucidate drusenko's point:

As to commonality, who knows?

As to preferability: it is very, very rarely preferable for an investor to be in this situation.

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