Facebook IPO

[UFO]

The company will be valued at $75-$100 billion.  They produce nothing.  They own no factories, capital equipment (other than servers somewhere), they don't import/export anything.  They push all of our information around in the form of 1s & 0s.

$100 billion.

[Justin]

I thought the dot.com bubble popped a long time ago  

I just don't get it apparently. Seems   to me.

[CLAY]

It will be interesting to see what the market says...

[Tyrroneous]

And 10 years from now FB will be just like Myspace is now...a has been worth next to nothing.

[ray916mn]

They currently carry 30+% of all Internet display advertising. Google for comparison sake carries under 10%.

800 Million pairs of eyeballs for $100B ~ $125 per set of eyeballs.... Note, this eyeball valuation doesn't value growth of their market share of the Internet.

[rgbeard]

One of the brokers in my wife's office got his hands on some IPO shares.

We'll see what kind of magic he works for his clientele.  

I don't know if I'm :       or more        or just      

[Scratch33]

They produce nothing.

During the tulip mania, you at least got tulips.

[county]

 They produce nothing.  

\\\


They produce a shit load of revenue....

[scottzilla]

I'm shutting down my FB page the moment it goes public just to fuck them up.  

[Justin]

I'm shutting down my FB page the moment it goes public just to fuck them up.  

That'll teach them!  

 

Wish you told me that before I sold my house and bought 2 shares.

[Mr.Black]

They currently carry 30+% of all Internet display advertising. Google for comparison sake carries under 10%.

800 Million pairs of eyeballs for $100B ~ $125 per set of eyeballs.... Note, this eyeball valuation doesn't value growth of their market share of the Internet.

I have joined a sports equipment flash sales(?) business that I saw on my FB page and have spent $20.00 at that site.

$20.00 x ???.???.???.00  is a lot of $.

[bungie4]

Their business model is a Ponzi scheme.

They make money off advertising revenue. Their advertising carries the lowest click through rates. So long as they keep adding new customers (users and ad buyers), they'll make money.

Now all that being said, we just launched a VERY high end FB app. and I know have a serious interest in their continued success.

rawh rawk FB!

[satxbonneville]

I plan to wait until it dies an ugly, protracted death and then buy at $0.25 per share and ask for paper so that I can add to my collection of worthless tech stock.

The people driving this economy have lost their friggin' minds.  

[phoenix]

The people driving this economy have lost their friggin' minds.  

+1

[Stickman]

One of the brokers in my wife's office got his hands on some IPO shares.

We'll see what kind of magic he works for his clientele.  

I don't know if I'm :       or more        or just      

How is this possible?  No date set as yet.  For such a simple business model, they produce staggerring revenue.  Regardless if they produce anything, they connect people to eachother and don't have any viable competitors at present.

[ray916mn]

For all this is an opportunity to make money.

Think that this is a bubble and doomed to failure. Short the sucker.

Think this is the best thing since sliced bread and going to be a big winner, get in and go long on it.

For all those with deep convictions about how this will go, the opportunity is coming for you to put your money where your mouth is.

Personally, I'm too dumb to have a clue how this will go, but I can smell the opportunity and am working on learning more.

[bomber]

If memory serves, it took Amazon a fair amount f time before it was profitable, and I don't think many doubt it's value now . . .  . .

While facebook doesn't make anything tangible (as UFO states), neither does most of Microsoft, all of SAP, Oracle . . . . .it is simply a different way of demonstrating value and making money . .. .

I think FB's growth in profitability will stabilize in short order, but wouldn't count it as a bust -- there are many companies paying to get out in front of FB's customers . . . . .

[Mr.Black]

STN is not tangible either and UFO is raking in the bucks from the ads.









 

Sorry Boss, I couldn't resist.

Please don't send me back there.

[antvq]

IPO or no IPO...FB keeps forcing changes on users they don't want they will go the way of MySpace.    Most folks left MySpace for FB because MySpace was forcing changes on them they didn't want.

Now FB is doing the same with Timeline.  Only 8% of those surveyed liked it, but FB is forcing everyone onto it whether you like it or not.   FB may find another upstart nipping at their heels and poaching customers if they keep it up.

[mxvet57]

I'm not on FB and i couldn't care less.

[rgbeard]

How is this possible?  No date set as yet.  For such a simple business model, they produce staggerring revenue.  Regardless if they produce anything, they connect people to eachother and don't have any viable competitors at present.

If you have a client determined to invest say several $MM in an IPO, you express that interest to your firm's trading desk.  They roll-up all the monies from the interested brokers and contact the potential issuer of the IPO and secure an agreement on share availability.  

By the time the actual IPO happens, the shares are already pre-sold at the IPO price.  Typically by two-weeks to opening bell, all the IPO shares have homes. (mostly institutional investors.  Very little from individual investors)

In the particular case of my wife's office one client has successfully purchased into a couple of different IPOs in the past, and has expressed interest in FaceBook.  So shares are already promised for him.  (Expressed interest means more than a phonecall.  It means cash-on-hand waiting.)

If you buy genuine IPO shares, as an individual investor, the firms usually restrict you from trading them for 30 days from the acquisition date.  Should you sell prior to 30days you can expect to have future IPO requests declined.

[Mr.Black]

I'm not on FB and i couldn't care less.

You'd just constantly post pics of your homo foo foo lattes.

[Stickman]

rgbeard - Not trying to argue, but that's wrong.

Indications of interest are not word of mouth commitments.  No IOI's have been taken yet, at any level.  Allocations are driven in part by IOI's, but it's different from firm to firm - in most cases if a retail advisor has clients who participate in every banking deal (even the bad ones) they will merit some consideration from the bankers, but not usually with the hot deals.  Unless this guy in your wife's office is the biggest broker in his region and does tons of syndicate business, I'd bet he doesn't get 100 shares in total - and probably less than that unless he's with MS or GS.  Trust me, I know how it works; I have coordinated syndicate deals for my offices and placed IPO's with my clients for many years.  Selling restrictions are also vastly different from firm to firm, and with allocations on hot deals they would be among the last things the bankers consider.

[SalsaShark]

Interesting read on the ticker this morning...

Ok folks, it's not often that I issue a rank do not buy statement on an S-1 (in fact, since starting the Ticker I can't recall ever doing it) but this is one where I feel I need to.

It's Facebook.

I'm basing this on one, and only one, criteria -- the rate of acquisition of new accounts is slowing.

That's all I need to know and it should be all you need to know -- the company filed the S-1 as soon as they detected this slowdown in December.

In addition participation is narrowing; there were 1.74 users monthly per daily user in 2011, but 1.86 a year prior.

These are potential signs of leveling off.  The deal with almost-certainly price assuming a ridiculous price to sales and price to earnings multiple, which means that the growth numbers must be maintained as the P/E/G ratio will be in the stratosphere.

If it's not you're going to get your head cut off.

The rest of the article - "FB": DO NOT BUY