Facebook launched its IPO at $38, which valued the company at about $104B. After three days the stock had fallen to about $31, which is still a P/E (price to earnings) multiple of over 102. For comparison, Google, Apple and Microsoft had P/E multiples of 18, 13 and 10 respectively on the same day.
It is rare, though not completely unprecedented, and generally considered a failure when an IPO trades below its issue price in the immediate aftermath of issuance. There are allegations of incomplete information disclosure.
At least one law firm has filed a class action suit alleging improper (i.e. selective) disclosure in the runup to the IPO. If more haven’t been filed yet, they will be.
Morgan Stanley is stuck with explaining how it’s come to this, though it has been supporting the issue (called “stabilizing” it), and has made a further profit on that work. Facebook is being accused of being greedy in its repricing of the IPO range. Nasdaq is investigating trading irregularities in the opening minutes of Facebook’s offer.
The SEC is investigating.
The Wall Street Journal is reporting that the Facebook IPO was “among the worst big US IPO starts in 5 years.” In sheer size, only VISA and General Motors had larger IPOs.
Certainly not the launch Facebook was planning for.
You can spend a lot of time and energy with the world’s best experts planning an excellent launch, but even in that there are risks if the final IPO pricing is not right or the disclosure of information seems unbalanced.
Whether this is a long-term failure, or a small stumble out of the gate only time will tell, but it’s not the start they were looking for.