Posted by Sir Four at 9:07am Jun 5 '12It's had one of the worst post-IPO performances in recent years.
The IPO price was nuts. It was more a factor of people wanting to own something "big" and "well-known", and be part of an exciting IPO, that drove up the price. I remember one commentator on NPR saying Facebook would have to increase its profits by a factor of 10 in the next three years to justify the opening stock price.
Facebook just doesn't have a good plan to monetize their site. What do you think they could do to generate more revenue? I think they should go to an optional subscription model, like 4thKingdom. Don't take away any existing features, but add a some bells and whistles for a reasonable price. Maybe something like statistics/reports, early ("beta") access to new features or games, skins to change the appearance, things like that. If they convert 1 out of every 100 users into a paying customer, it would be pretty huge. The advertising model just doesn't seem to be working very well for them.
As for the stock price, I don't see it going up any time soon.
The IPO price was nuts. It was more a factor of people wanting to own something "big" and "well-known", and be part of an exciting IPO, that drove up the price. I remember one commentator on NPR saying Facebook would have to increase its profits by a factor of 10 in the next three years to justify the opening stock price.
Facebook just doesn't have a good plan to monetize their site. What do you think they could do to generate more revenue? I think they should go to an optional subscription model, like 4thKingdom. Don't take away any existing features, but add a some bells and whistles for a reasonable price. Maybe something like statistics/reports, early ("beta") access to new features or games, skins to change the appearance, things like that. If they convert 1 out of every 100 users into a paying customer, it would be pretty huge. The advertising model just doesn't seem to be working very well for them.
As for the stock price, I don't see it going up any time soon.
Did anyone buy Facebook shares? - Sir Four