So you'd think that publicly traded DST would be the belle of the bear market.
Good news for the stock:DST is reportedly looking to sell its cable billing operations.
Next May, another 47.3 million shares held by Mail.ru and DST Global become free trading.
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This makes DST a more attractive source of funding than typical VCs and the public markets.
Even so, DST's national origin could still matter as the firm makes further investments.
Thanks to strong revenues and a big investment from Russian firm DST, Facebook now has that cash.
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Today, Yuri Milner, Alisher Usmanov and their DST partners have become the favorites of Silicon Valley start-ups.
On May 18, 2013, the lock-up expires on 47 million shares held by Mail.ru and DST Global.
FORBES: Facebook: Zuckerberg Won't Sell Any Shrs For Next 12 Mos
Existing shareholders including Silver Lake, DST Global and Temasek participated by increasing their investment in the company.
DST's corporate structure allows it to act quickly, and to make offers that are hard to refuse.
To address foreign ownership issues in China, DST and Silver Lake will cede voting control to Alibaba management.
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And although Naspers does not intend to make any investments in Western countries, Tencent may follow DST in doing so.
And DST gets paid for each shareholder account its specialized software processes, regardless of the rise and fall in asset value.
Starting in the summer of 2009, Russian holding firm Digital Sky Technologies (DST) began taking huge stakes in successful American startups.
The investment in DST may also lead to Tencent co-investing with DST in deals in the US and around the world.
FORBES: BRICs Meet SARCs: Tencent, Digital Sky Technologies and Naspers
Bidders reportedly showing an interest in the Sunnyvale, California-based company include Silver Lake, Peter Chernin, Providence Equity Partners, DST Global and Alibaba Group.
Next, what remained of the prince's business empire - the lucrative Jasra oil interests and the DST mobile phone company - was expropriated.
The deal made DST one of the largest first-class mailers in the U.S. 1.8 billion items in 2000 but the new business has its own problems.
Little surprise Stilwell boss Landon Rowland has been known to joke that life would be easier if his chief investment were in DST and not Janus.
Both Milner and his DST and Paul Graham and his Y Combinator are hot right now and Forbes has been right there covering both of them.
The firm, which changed its name from Digital Sky Technologies last month, owns about 2.5% of Facebook, with another 7.5% owned by its sister company DST Global.
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Somewhat irrationally, investors have responded by unloading their DST shares.
In contrast, analysts say, DST may have overpaid for Zynga, the world's largest online-gaming service, and for Groupon, a website that aggregates buyers and gets them special deals.
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Tiger Global Management, a New York hedge fund that is also a shareholder in DST, has already specialised in investing in start-ups beyond the West's well-known technology clusters.
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Stilwell owns 33% of DST and 90% of Janus, whose flashy managers want nothing to do with the parent and aren't happy about being lumped together with steady-as-you-go DST.
The new ICQ owner is Digital Sky Technologies (DST), a high-flying Russian Internet firm with investments in social networks (Facebook and Zynga, which makes games for SNS portals) and webmail.
Mutual fund giants like Fidelity Investments handle their own back-office work, but DST is by far the biggest player in the other 60% of the fund industry that contracts out.
Desktop and mobile music streaming service Spotify is close to completing a new round of funding from Facebook backers DST Global and Kleiner Perkins, according to sources close to the deal.
FORBES: Yuri Milner's DST Global Bets On Spotify's Future In America And Mobile
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