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This is not worthy to be posted here. It's one paragraph in an blog post: "First, Facebook insiders chose to sell a ridiculous amount of their shares relative

by smackfu 14y ago

This is not worthy to be posted here. It's one paragraph in an blog post: "First, Facebook insiders chose to sell a ridiculous amount of their shares relative to the last major Internet-related IPO, Google. When Google went public, insiders dumped 28% of their shares. Facebook insiders, on the other hand, sold 57% of their shares on Friday." Comparing two data points isn't exactly rigorous argument. Maybe 28% is low for Google. What is the average? An actual article on this would be interesting. A paragraph in some dude's blog? Pointless. And really, the correct phrasing should be: "57% of the Facebook stock being offered in the IPO is coming from insiders selling shares."

va_coder 14y ago
It's useful to me. The amount of words doesn't equal the quality of the content. When my dad asks if he thinks he should buy some Facebook stock, I can tell him the IPO was more about allowing insiders to sell their stock than raise capital. Red flag
- smackfu 14y ago
  I personally look for sourcing and well argued points when evaluating the quality of the content. This has neither, since it's just an aside in a bigger article. The submitter didn't even use the blog title which is the standard here.
- drumdance 14y ago
  This is largely true of most IPOs. Until the dot-com bubble IPOs were to be avoided by investors until the company had a few quarters to prove their business delivers consistent returns.
- ljd 14y ago
  As most of us in the weeks leading to the FB IPO, I was also asked by friends and family if they should buy stock and the best answer was not to give hard yes/no's because I simply didn't know how the market will react to something this unprecedented. However, coming from a value investment and algorithmic asset valuation background I explained the problem to them this way: A Honda Civic is a great car at $20k? Yes. Is a Honda Civic a good car at $90k? Probably not. Could you find someone to buy it at that price? Probably. Should you buy it at that point? That's what buying FB at a $110bn valuation is. It's still a great car but I'm not going to buy it for that price.

by smackfu 14y ago

va_coder 14y ago

It's useful to me. The amount of words doesn't equal the quality of the content. When my dad asks if he thinks he should buy some Facebook stock, I can tell him the IPO was more about allowing insiders to sell their stock than raise capital. Red flag

smackfu 14y ago
I personally look for sourcing and well argued points when evaluating the quality of the content. This has neither, since it's just an aside in a bigger article. The submitter didn't even use the blog title which is the standard here.
drumdance 14y ago
This is largely true of most IPOs. Until the dot-com bubble IPOs were to be avoided by investors until the company had a few quarters to prove their business delivers consistent returns.
ljd 14y ago
As most of us in the weeks leading to the FB IPO, I was also asked by friends and family if they should buy stock and the best answer was not to give hard yes/no's because I simply didn't know how the market will react to something this unprecedented. However, coming from a value investment and algorithmic asset valuation background I explained the problem to them this way: A Honda Civic is a great car at $20k? Yes. Is a Honda Civic a good car at $90k? Probably not. Could you find someone to buy it at that price? Probably. Should you buy it at that point? That's what buying FB at a $110bn valuation is. It's still a great car but I'm not going to buy it for that price.