Market Update – 2nd February 2012

Facebook have announced plans to float on the stock market. It is looking to raise $5 billion in an IPO. It has filed its intention to list with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Form S-1 REGISTRATION STATEMENT Under The Securities Act of 1933 - Facebook, Inc. SEC.gov

It is valued at around $75 billion, less than the initial $100 billion figure that was quoted by many. However, some analysts think that this figure is still too high and the interest in the stock will mostly be driven by brand awareness and not by sound analysis of its potentials, risk and market development.

Facebook has been growing at a staggering rate but some people feel that it is reached its peak already. Around 480 million people log on every day, however, it does not seem to be gaining new clients (users) as quickly as it once did. However, it is now investing heavily in mobile and expects most new users to be solely mobile users.

Terms of the Facebook IPO

Facebook, Inc. is offering _____ shares of its Class A common stock and the selling stockholders are offering _____ shares of Class A common stock. We will not receive any proceeds from the sale of shares by the selling stockholders. This is our initial public offering and no public market currently exists for our shares of Class A common stock. We anticipate that the initial public offering price will be between $ _____ and $ _____ per share.

We have two classes of authorized common stock, Class A common stock and Class B common stock. The rights of the holders of Class A common stock and Class B common stock are identical, except with respect to voting and conversion. Each share of Class A common stock is entitled to one vote per share. Each share of Class B common stock is entitled to ten votes per share and is convertible at any time into one share of Class A common stock. Outstanding shares of Class B common stock will represent approximately _____ % of the voting power of our outstanding capital stock following this offering, and outstanding shares of Class A common stock and Class B common stock held by, or subject to voting control by, our founder, Chairman, and CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, will represent approximately _____ % of the voting power of our outstanding capital stock following this offering.

We intend to apply to list our Class A common stock on under the symbol “FB.”

There are a few blanks in there still to be completed.

When will Facebook Float?

“Approximate date of commencement of proposed sale to the public: As soon as practicable after the effective date of this Registration Statement.”

It was not so long ago that Mark Zuckerberg said that he was not in any hurry to float Facebook. It’s cash flow is strong and there seemed little reason to raise capital through a stock market flotation. So the big question is why?

Possible Takeovers?

For Facebook to really grow and dominate they may need to look to make some constructive partnerships and even some aggressive acquisitions. Mobile is the hot trend at the moment and Facebook currently hardly involved at all. Their website is present on all mobile smartphones but Facebook do not provide their own mobile service. Advertising is hot too and currently Facebook struggle to provide any form of targeted adverts to its members on mobile devices. These are two areas that they could be looking to expand into.

Bigger than Yahoo!

Valued at $100 billion Facebook is currently bigger than Yahoo! Although to be fair, Yahoo! is not exactly growing at the moment, they continue to drop more products and some tech analysts fear that Yahoo! may eventually be merged into a multitude of competing businesses in the near future.

Facebook history

Facebook was founded in 2001 by Mark Zuckerberg while he was studying at Harvard University. It has quickly grown in the last 7 years to have over 800 million users. What is so striking about Facebook’ success is that it has always managed to stay on top of its growth. Many small websites would very quickly fail when experiencing such high demand, but Facebook has had next to no downtime during its lifetime. This is a great credit to the company and all those who manage its servers and infrastructure.

One of the Biggest IPOs in History

To date only 13 companies have been valued at over $10 billion on their IPO. The top American companies prior to Facebook were:

• Visa Inc. at $19.7 billion in 2008
• General Motors Co. at $18.1 billion in 2010
• AT&T Wireless Services Inc. at $10.6 billion in 2000

The largest IPO in the world so far was the Industrial & Commercial Bank of China, which released $21.9 billion of shares in 2006. It ended its first day valued at $148 billion.

How Much Does Mark Zuckerberg Earn?

According to the SEC registration statement Mark Zuckerberg had a basic salary of $500,000 in 2009, with a bonus of $220,500 and additional benefits worth $783,529 – a total of $1,487,362.

This is actually considerably less than the CEOs and Vice Presidents who all received stock awards:

• Sheryl K. Sandberg, Chief Operating Officer - $30,873,579
• David A. Ebersman, Chief Financial Officer – $18,676,918
• Mike Schroepfer, Vice President of Engineering – $24,727,128
• Theodore W. Ullyot, Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary – $6,958,544

More on the Facebook IPO story:

• Boot up: Facebook IPO ‘in Q2 2012′, inside Amazon.com, and more – Guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 29 November 2011
• Is Facebook worth $100bn? - Guardian.co.uk, Thursday 2 February 2012

Google has seen its revenue increase by 27% for the final quarter, and 29% overall for 2011. However, this increase in revenue has still fallen short of shareholder expectations and as a result many people are selling. Google share price has dropped by 10% after the results were released, plummeting share price to $575 per share.

However, shares have already bounced back, and are currently trading at $639.57 (Jan 20, 6:42AM EST).

Some analysts fear that Google is investing too heavily in new areas of its business which is reducing the overall profits it gains from its advertising and search marketing business. Although Google has many products and services, its core business is still in placing adverts on its search engine. This is how it generates its revenue and it is this money that is reinvested back into new projects.

This year Google launched its Google+ Social Network and is determined to make it work – all staff bonuses will be partly determined based on the success (or failure) of its social network. Google recognises that in recent years the “web portal” has returned, i.e. Facebook.

In the earlier days of the Internet people would make a portal site, such as Yahoo!, their homepage and start their daily web searching and surfing from there. Then Google search came along and people chose to start their web journey with a blank screen and a search box. However, nowadays people go direct to Facebook or Twitter to see what their friends and acquaintances are talking about online, and Google has been left out of the picture. This is why it is now resolved to build a social network that can rival Facebook.

Of course, all this costs money. In the last year Google has been hiring more staff to help drive forward its other enterprises, such as its Chrome operating system and browser, as well as Google+, and this has resulted in Google’s costs rising by 54%.

Google hired an additional 1900 people during the first quarter and plans to hire another 6000 people this year. In recent years many people have criticised Google for its lack of customer support, and many new jobs have been creating in client facing teams. Google is working more closely with web advertising agencies and web publishers, by organising events and sending Googlers (Google employees) out into the field to spend time learning from the people who essentially keep the Internet alive. This of course is much more costly than the old approach of communicating via forums when time permits!

Android

Google also firmly believes that the future of the Internet is in mobile technology. As more people buy smartphones and tablets, more searches are being done on mobile devices. This opens a whole new world of opportunities for advertisers, and Google is determined to not only be in control of the mobile operating systems (Android) but also to ensure it maintains its market share in advertising as more people leave the PC based websites to spend more on advertising on mobile.

It is possible that in years to come the traditional PC advertising will wane away in much the same way that print advertising has decline in the last decade. Mobile, many people believe, is the future. The days of people sitting hunched over an computer or laptop are numbered.

Last year Google did announce that there is a tough year ahead and that some changes in the pipeline are vital for long term growth and may impact on short term profits. Shareholders were warned in early 2011, so mustn’t grumble really. Google is still the top tech stock and is positioning itself for the future rather than simply maximising profits today.

When Larry Page took over the role as CEO, Steven Levy, the author of In The Plex: How Google Thinks, Works, and Shapes Our Lives, predicted that,

“We’ll see audacious new products, particularly when other people think it’ll be difficult or even impossible — it’s not always about what people need right now, but what people need in 10 years.”

Investment for the future is paramount. Early in 2011 investors were concerned about the rise of Facebook, saying the Google will be left behind. In the last year Google has steamed ahead with its own social media platform and made big moves in the mobile internet arena too.

RBS, and us, the taxpayers, will be having to cough up £2.17 million to pay an FSA fine incurred by Churchill Insurance and Direct Line. Both Churchill Insurance Company Limited and Direct Line are private companies, owned by the Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc..

It was discovered that both of these companies had altered customer files to remove and downplay complaints against them.

The FSA has pointed out that overall the changes to the customer files have not affected customers, however, the act of removing or editing customer complaints is a serious breach of FSA rules and it has therefore imposed a hefty fine.

In one case a member of staff had also forged the signature of colleagues. It is a requirement that any changes to client data are checked and verified before being updated. These rules usually apply only to general administration, such as the updating of accounts and processing of corporate actions for shareholders. The fact that an individual had been forging signatures is another serious breach and highlights how easily fraud and corruption can take place in the workplace.

The FSA have also pointed out that while the managers were not aware that these alterations had taken place, they had not taken appropriate measures to ensure that staff were aware that such alterations were against company policy and FSA rules. A lack of staff training is something that the FSA takes very seriously. For example, all staff working in investments and dealing with client money must go on money laundering courses every 2 years to ensure that they are kept up to date on rule and regulations.

This news has not affected Royal Bank of Scotland Group plc  (Public, LON:RBS) share price, it is currently trading at 24.86p, up 0.04% so far today.

Jerry Yang

PRESS RELEASE FROM YAHOO!

SUNNYVALE, Calif.– (BUSINESS WIRE)– Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO), the premier digital media company, today announced that Jerry Yang has resigned from its Board of Directors and all other positions with the company, effective today. In addition, Yang resigned from the Boards of Yahoo Japan Corporation and Alibaba Group Holding Limited, effective today.

In a letter to the Yahoo! Board Chairman Roy Bostock (who has had to fire himself), Yang wrote:

“My time at Yahoo!, from its founding to the present, has encompassed some of the most exciting and rewarding experiences of my life. However, the time has come for me to pursue other interests outside of Yahoo! As I leave the company I co-founded nearly 17 years ago, I am enthusiastic about the appointment of Scott Thompson as Chief Executive Officer and his ability, along with the entire Yahoo! leadership team, to guide Yahoo! into an exciting and successful future.”

Yang co-founded Yahoo! Inc. in 1995 with David Filo and served as a member of the Board of Directors since March 1995 and as Chief Executive Officer from June 2007 to January 2009. The Company went public in 1996.

“Jerry Yang is a visionary and a pioneer, who has contributed enormously to Yahoo! during his many years of service,” said Roy Bostock, Chairman of the Yahoo! Board. “It has been a pleasure to work with Jerry. His unique strategic insights have been invaluable. He has always remained focused on the best interests of Yahoo!’s stakeholders, including shareholders, employees and more than 700 million users. And while I and the entire Board respect his decision, we will miss his remarkable perspective, vision and wise counsel. On behalf of the Board, we thank Jerry and wish him all the very best in his future endeavors.”

Bostock concluded, “We appreciate Jerry’s comments and share his enthusiasm for the company’s prospects. With Scott Thompson leading an outstanding team of Yahoos to deliver innovative products and an engaging customer experience, Yahoo!’s future is bright.”

“I am grateful for the warm welcome and support Jerry provided me during my early days here,” said Scott Thompson, Yahoo!’s Chief Executive Officer. “Jerry leaves behind a legacy of innovation and customer focus for this iconic brand, having shaped our culture by fostering a spirit of innovation that began 17 years ago and continues to grow even stronger today. Jerry has great confidence in the future of Yahoo!, and I share his confidence in the enormous potential of Yahoo! in the days ahead.”

Forward Looking Statements

This press release contains forward-looking statements (including without limitation the quotations from our Chairman and management) concerning Yahoo!’s future management, strategic plans, growth opportunities and performance.

Risks and uncertainties may cause actual results to differ materially from the results predicted. The potential risks and uncertainties include, among others, the impact of management and organizational changes; the implementation and results of any strategic plans as well as Yahoo!’s ongoing strategic and cost initiatives; Yahoo!’s ability to compete with new or existing competitors; reduction in spending by, or loss of, advertising customers; the demand by customers for Yahoo!’s premium services; interruptions or delays in the provision of Yahoo!’s services; security breaches; acceptance by users of new products and services; risks related to joint ventures and the integration of acquisitions; risks related to Yahoo!’s international operations; failure to manage growth and diversification; adverse results in litigation, including intellectual property infringement claims and recent derivative and class actions related to Alipay; Yahoo!’s ability to protect its intellectual property and the value of its brands; dependence on key personnel; dependence on third parties for technology, services, content, and distribution; general economic conditions and changes in economic conditions; transition and implementation risks associated with the Search Agreement with Microsoft Corporation; and risks that the benefits of the Framework Agreement Yahoo! entered into with Alibaba Group, Softbank Corporation and certain other parties regarding Alipay may not be realized. All information set forth in this press release and its attachments is as of January 17, 2012. Yahoo! does not intend, and undertakes no duty, to update this information to reflect subsequent events or circumstances.

More information about potential factors that could affect Yahoo!’s business and financial results is included under the captions “Risk Factors” and “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations” in Yahoo!’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2010, and the Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended September 30, 2011, which are on file with the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) and available at the SEC’s website at www.sec.gov.

Sources:

• Yahoo! Inc. - http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Yahoo-Announces-Resignation-bw-3358038648.html?x=0
• Yahoo! Announces Resignation of Jerry Yang - Yahoo Investor Relations

News Provided by Acquire Media

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Peacocks, the Welsh retail giant owned by the Peacock Group that grew from very humble beginnings in a penny arcade in Chesire is on the brink of falling into administration.

It developed as a retailer of woman’s clothing and has grown in recent decades to become a more dominant brand on high streets across the UK.

Peacock’s has around 600 stores in the UK and 100 overseas stores. It employs around 10,000 staff in the UK.

It’s main problem is that it is around £240 million debt and is struggling to manage its debts. Analysts have pointed out that RBS has stopped lending to many retailers and this credit crunch is strangling cash flow and forcing retailers, large and small, out of business.

There is no news on their Twitter feed at the moment. A few days ago there were reports of problems with the Peacocks website,

“Guys and girls, we’re sorry about our website issues, we’re working really hard to get things fixed - 14 Jan”

Peacock has filed an “intention to appoint administrators” and has 10 days to attempt to restructure its debt before it starts to go into administration.

More on Peacocks’ challenge to avoid going into administration soon.

The wide range of mortgage rates on the market has always been confusing, but the picture is complicated by the fact that the Bank of England base rate has now been at a record low of 0.5% since March 2009. That doesn’t mean there’s an undisputed “right” answer as to which rate type is best for you, but it does change some of the factors you need to take into account.

The Standard Variable Rate is the simplest type of mortgage and means that the lender decides what your interest rate is at any time. This is usually decided by a combination of the Bank of England base rate and the competition in the mortgage market. Traditionally the advice has been to go for this if you don’t mind taking the risk that rates will rise. In today’s climate, the standard rate is still very affordable for many people, and there’s no sign of it changing soon: the most recent Monetary Policy Committee meeting saw a unanimous 9-0 vote to keep the rate unchanged. Bear in mind, though, that while the timing is uncertain, it’s as certain as can be that the rate will change in the long run, and there’s only one direction it’s going to move in: up.

What about a fixed rate? Well, it’s still a form of gamble as you are effectively predicting the variable rate won’t go below this fixed rate. While lenders may offer a fixed rate at any time, it’s most common at the start of a loan, for anything between one and five years. Before taking out such a deal, you should find out whether there are any penalties if you decide to pay it off early, for example by re-mortgaging with another lender for a lower rate. You’ll also need to check what happens to the rate at the end of the fixed period: usually it shoots up to the variable rate, which could mean a significant hike in your monthly costs if the Bank of England has decided it’s time to tackle inflation by then.

You could also opt for a tracker rate, in which the rate you pay is directly linked to the Bank of England base rate, for example being half a percentage point higher. The effect is that your costs can be affected by the Bank of England’s decisions, but not by the bank’s own variations. Given that banks have been so hesitant to take risks on loans that there’s not as much competition in the market as usual, you can effectively look at this in the same way as the standard variable rate.

Another option is the cap and collar, another fixed-variable hybrid. A cap rate means you have a variable rate but, during a specified time, it can only rise up to a certain level. A cap and collar rate works the same way, but there’s also a minimum level, meaning you don’t benefit even if market rates go below this. For some borrowers this can be an effective compromise between having relatively low rates but reducing uncertainty.

All in all, the mortgage rate game remains as much of a game of predictions as ever. Fixed rates offer more certainty, while variable rates are a more explicit gamble, with tracker or cap/collar rates somewhere in between. Right now the premium you pay for a fixed rate (and thus the savings that come with the variable rate) is relatively low. That said, even if you make a rate decision based on the on-going low Bank of England base rate, you should still at least consider how you’d cope if your payments rose rapidly.

Photo by Richard Webb.

1958 Saab 92B

Saab Automobile AB, maker of classic cars such as the Saab 99, Saab 900, Saab 900 S Classic Convertible and Saab Sonnet, has filed for bankruptcy.

Its former owner, General Motors, recently turned down an investment from the Chinese company Zhejiang Youngman Lotus Automobile Co. Ltd that would have provided a life-line for Saab.

Saab employs around 3400 people, many have been without pay. The bankruptcy and liquidation deal will hopefully provide a payout package for its employees, although it is not known if an emergency fund can be provided before Christmas.

Saab started out in 1944 as Svenska Aeroplan AB when its Project 92 created the first Saab car, the Saab 92001 (also known as the Ursaab). This was the most aerodynamic car ever built – Saab used its skills in the aviation industry to produce a car with a very low drag coefficient (0.30).

Saab-Scania was formed in 1969 when Saab and Scania-Vabis Am merged. A decade later Saab made a deal with Fiat and the Lancia Delta was rebranded as the Saab 600. This led to a range of cars on the same Type Four chassis, including the Saab 9000, Alfa Romeo 164, Fiat Croma and Lancia Thema.

In 1989 General Motors controlled a controlling stake in the business and launched the new Saab 900 in 1994. The success of this and the Opel Vectra that was built on the same platform, Saab made a profit in 1995, the first in 7 years. In 2000 General Motors bought the remaining Saab shares to take full ownership.

Unfortunately GM’s decision to launch the Saab 9-2X (that was based on the Subaru Impreza) and Saab 9-7X (that was based on the Chevrolet Trailblazer) resulted in a commercial disaster.

GM put Saab under review in 2008 while deciding if it could turn the business back to profit. Talks of sales and takeovers continued for several years and eventually GM agreed to allow Spyker to purchase Saab. In April 2011 Spyker announced plans to focus entirely on the Saab brand by selling off its sports car business. However, by June problems in the supply chain led to parts shortages and this had a knock-on effect, by July Saab was struggling to pay the salaries of 1600 workers.

Saab filed for bankruptcy protection on September 7, 2011 to keep the company alive until a Chinese investment could be agreed. However, the Swedish courts rejected the petition for bankruptcy protection.

Today Saab officially filed for bankruptcy.

Photo by Martin Bergstrand

Do you really understand what the National Debt is? A recent Channel 4 Programme actually revelad that a number of MPs do not understand this so it is hardly surprising if members of the public are confused. The best way to understand it is to think of it as a mortgage (probably best seen as a Commercial Mortgage) on a Property.

At present in simple terms the National Debt is just over £900 billion. So that represents the mortgage capital. What then is the figures of about £150 million you hear talked about and described as the Deficit? That is the amount each year that the Government overspends.

So if you had a commercial mortgage that you were repaying over 15 years and your payments each year were £5,000 but you only paid back £4,000 you would have a deficit of £1,000 to be added to your capital.

In the case of the Government they get in tax income of say £600 billion and if they spend £799 billion then the extra £100 billion has to be added back to the Capital. So if the debt starts at £900 billion in 2011 and by the end of the year we have over spent £100 billion then the capital on your commercial mortgage is now £1 TRILLION.

You do not have to be Adam Smith to see that at these rates of overspend you are quickly going to get a  “mortgage” that is out of control very quickly because your debt is increasing by over 10% in just one year.

Why is this suddenly a problem if we have been consistently overspending every year since 1997, There are a number of reasons that can be summarised as follows using again the analogy of a mortgage.

If the debt on a mortgage increases but the Lender believes that you are able to meet the new debt because your income has increased even further or the capital value of your property has shot up they may well be happy to allow you to have more debt.

If the Lender loses confidence that you can afford the new mortgage repayments then they will want to review your mortgage arrangements.

In the case of both Britain and the Eurozone the recession has meant that their income and capital values have fallen so that the Lenders in the market no longer have faith in their abillity to repay the loans due. Because we do not have a fixed term mortgage but need to borrow on a regular basis the Lender can suddently increase interest rates on the new borrowings and make the situation even worse.

So we can no longer afford to keep running a deficit every year and adding to the National Debt but have to find a repayment plan for our National Mortgage that the Markets will believe in. If we do not find that plan then we could find our house being repossessed and that is the reason why the National Debt is now such a problem for us.

Marcus Selmon is a writer and consultant for Just Commercial Mortgages.com one of the UK’s top sites for the latest commercial mortgage rates and commercial property news.

Thomas Cook issued 3 profit warnings this year and has now announced losses of £400 million. It is planning some major restructuring to solve its cash crisis. There will be around 200 store closures with redundancies all over the country. There are 110 stores that will definitely close, although no jobs will close before Christmas. In total it is expected that around 1000 jobs will be lost over the next 2 years.

It was less than a month ago that we reported that Thomas Cook shares plummet on debt Worries and that Thomas Cook was securing more funds from its investors.

The recent merger with Co-op boosted their high street shops to around 1400, and there are now simply too many high street shops in their portfolio.

Share price has crashed by 90% this year. Thomas Cook was trading at a high of 206.8p in 2010 and is currently trading at 14.41p (9am, 14/12/11). You can follow the latest share prices at here: www.google.co.uk/finance?cid=716892.

Thomas Cook sells around 22 million holidays a year in the UK and still controls a huge part of the UK market. Like many other businesses it is selling more of its products and services online via its website. People are still using Thomas Cook to search for and book holidays (22 million is a very healthy number of sales for any business) but rather than go to the shops many people are online.

Thomas Cook Airlines will also be losing 6 of its aircraft. It got a very bad review from Which? this year, placing it below Ryan Air in terms of customer care and service.

Too Many Cheap Holidays Sold

Thomas Cook’s problem has been selling too many cheap holidays, with typical holidays sold including 2 start bed and breakfast deals to the Mediterranean and similar cheap and discount deals.

The suggestion is that for Thomas Cook to really thrive again it needs to start selling higher quality holidays which will have a larger profit margin. Some of the holidays sold may have been making them a loss, once the cost of sales is factored in.

Overall Thomas Cook’s sales are strong and it is hoped that this restructuring will result in a complete turnaround. Thomas Cook is no longer competing with other high street holiday companies, it is competing with the like of Expedia, Last Minute, Travel Supermarket and Virgin Holidays.

It seems that tech stocks are on the agenda again. After the first tech stock bubble burst investors became extremely wary of technology stock, especially Internet stocks, and started to question the valuations that many companies have been given. This year we have seen IPOs from Demand Media, LinkedIn, Yandex and Groupon.

The hot news at the moment is that of Facebook’s imminent flotation. Currently it is valued at around $100 billion, however, annual revenue from advertising is “only” and few billion dollars. Either way, the Facebook IPO is set to dwarf even the mighty Google. If the valuation of Facebook is accurate this means that Facebook will be one of the largest companies in the world, bigger than Tesco Plc..

Before looking at the tech stock IPOs of 2011, lets remind ourselves of the great success story, Google.com.

Google Corp. NASDAQ: GOOG – IPO $1.67 billion in 2004

Google’s IPO, underwritten by Morgan Stanley and Credit Suisse First Boston, was on 25th August, 2004. It released 19,605,052 shares at $85 each which raised $1.67 billion. Google was valued at $23 billion. A majority of Google’s shares (271 million in total) remain in Google’s control. Yahoo! is one of Google’s biggest shareholders, owning 2.7 million shares (see Yahoo and Google Settle from internetnews.com for more on this).

Google IPO: a success. Google today is trading at $628.79. See www.google.com/finance?cid=694653 for the latest prices.

Demand Media NYSE:DMD – IPO 1.3 billion – January 2011

Demand Media announced its IPO in January 2011. It’s IPO price was declared to be $16-18, valuing the company at $1.3 billion. It was $22.68 per share on the close of its first day trading. Since then its share price has fallen to $8.02.

Demand Media IPO: A loser. Demand Media has lost 2/3 of its value since the IPO.

Demand Media’ strength was in volume of content online and a readership that relied heavily on search engines (Google search referrals mostly). In February 2011 Google started making some ground-breaking changes to its search algorithm (the Panda / Farmer updates) and this has seen some parts of Demand Media suffer. Some of its brands lost huge numbers of daily readers. eHow.com lost 53.46% of its business and eHow.co.uk lost 72.30% (source: Google ‘Panda’ update downgrades UK tech sites – and Microsoft’s Ciao – 13 April 2011).

Yandex – IPO $1.3 billion – May 2011

Yandex is the Russian search engine and Internet media giant. See Yandex IPO at $25 a Share – The Russian Search Engine. It listed $1.3 billion of stock on the NASDAQ in May 2011 and started trading at $25. It finished trading at $38.84, however, it has since fallen to $21.50.

Part of Yandex’s strong early performance was attributed to a huge demand for tech stocks in general. Yandex is a huge company with a diverse offering and still a strong contender for the long-term. It is looking to expand in Europe and may start to provide more English language services. However, it is currently an IPO loser.

LinkedIn – IPO valued company at $3 billion – May 2011

LinkedIn.com proposed an IPO that valued it at $3 billion. It started trading on 19th May 2011 at $45 and closed at $94.25, more than doubling in value on the first day. Today it is trading at $69.81 which still represents a very healthy growth on its initial offer.

LinkedIn is still developing its revenue model. It has a huge number of professionals listed on its database, it is the business networking equivalent of Facebook. Like Facebook it is building its own advertising platform so that its users can drive more business to their profiles and websites through contextually driven and targeted advertising campaigns.

Overall LinkedIn is still a winner, although it has started to struggle in recent weeks as investors start to question the durability and reliability of its revenue model.

See www.google.com/finance?q=linkedin for the latest prices.

Groupon NASDAQ: GRPN IPO $700 million – November 2011

Second to Google is Groupon which had its IPO this year (see Groupon IPO Raises $700 million). Groupon shares started trading at $20 and reached $29 on their first day of trading. However, share price has fallen in recent weeks to $19 after reaching a high of $31.14.

Groupon IPO: a rocky ride, but steady now. One to watch!

Future Tech Stock IPOs

The big news is that Mark Zuckerburg is gearing up for a Facebook IPO. Currently the company is valued at $100 billion, making it the largest tech stock IPO ever, if it goes ahead and floats.

Other tech stocks looking to float include Zynga. Zynga is a social games maker with many of its games popular on Facebook. It really is a case that much of Zynga’s success is driven by Facebook. Zynga is the company behind popular social games such as Farmville, Mafia Wars and CityVille. It also has Zynga Poker, branded as the World’s largest free-to-play online poker game, which can be played on smartphones and Google+ in addition to Facebook.

Technology stocks are looking strong again at the moment. While traditional retail suffers the Internet continues to look strong – maybe the two are more closely connected that first assumed. Can the Internet be slowly eroding to dominance of the traditional high street brands? Amazon.com destroyed all but a few high street book stores. Talking of Amazon, that was one of the first big tech stock successes. It started trading at $13 on 15th May, 1997, valuing the company at $300 million. Today it is trading at $196.98, another huge success.