"Spending all this money"? How much did they spend?

I think you can answer your own rhetorical question. Point taken.

Do you generally have the impression that these acquihires are bonanzas? They aren't: they're usually only marginally more lucrative than the signing package for a senior hire gets anyways, and sometimes less so. Employers gussy them up for team members by giving aggregate numbers, counting on team members not to divide them by 4 and compare them to competing offers. Investors hate them.

The acquihired team is usually only getting two things from them: the founders save face (publicly, not with future investors, who know what an acquihire is), and the whole team gets placed, rather than having to interview individually.

Even that last bit isn't always true.