bwilson27: There should always be a deep distrust and general hatred towards the rich, in any society.

People who became rich through crony capitalism or though the parasitic finance industry? Sure. Hate them all you want.

People who became rich because they found a need among the populace and filled it? Why would you hate or distrust them?

Just shut up already. Stocks sometimes go down after an IPO. And they're not all winners. It's how the market works. It's like everyone just expected to buy some shares and next week they'd be millionaires.

We went public about 4 years ago, at $12.50 I think. Next day $10. Some time in the next year we were around $4 a share. We're now over $50. If you believe in Facebook, hold it. If you don't, you shouldn't have bought it in the first place. I will buy some if it goes much lower.

lemurs: From what I understand, there's plenty of reasons for this stock to continue to plummet:

1) Facebook's business is advertising, but they're not nearly as good as Google
2) Mobile is taking off, where Facebook is even worse at advertising
3) It's hard to see where Facebook's growth is going to come from
4) Facebook has been spending a lot of money on useless crap

So I wouldn't be surprised if it bottoms out in the $10 range.


**Disclaimer** I have little to no idea how the stock market actually works.

If you believe this strongly, is there anything to keep you or any other Joe Schmoe on the street from short selling a bunch of shares right now and making a lot of money? I'm honestly curious as to how this works.

antidumbass: One London market analyst said that Greek government bonds were a better offer. Yep!

/smells like pets.com and wine.com in here

Geocities for the abolute win!

/and throwing in webvan and drkoop just for good measure

FTFA
To be fair to Facebook, it is worth noting that newly-listed issues have a tendency to suffer more volatility in general. Throw in the frenzy around the offering - from Mark Zuckerberg's appearances, or lack thereof, during the company's roadshow to the controversy over Nasdaq's opening of the stock and whether underwriters including Morgan Stanley favored certain clients over others when selling the shares - and it adds up to a challenging start for company's public life. (See "Facebook Lawsuits Start Flying.")

This is what I hate about business articles. No one can come out and rip apart the bs like they would with any other product or movie or show. No, this guy piles on trying to make it like some sort of slight oversight was made.
This was nothing more than corruption, again, from Wall Street & a company that has never showed any respect towards its users or people.

But hey, lets be nice, and look at some numbers.
A fancy-pants, well-respected professor looked at the IPO and gave it some ridiculous level predictions. Google growth & Apple profits combined. Figured it was worth $25-$29 at best.

No I don't have citation. It was on the Motley Fool podcast.But looking at the real numbers & math it seems this stock is headed for it's true value. (aka not anywhere near $45 or even half of it.)

I cringe at these threads and all the negative forecasts. Sorry to say, but I bought into this hook, line, and sinker. Now all I can think about is the Golden Gate Bridge and the chilly waters far below.

Everywhere I go I see people using Facebook -- the checkout lady is too busy updating her status to attend to my groceries, my kids pretty much ignore me while playing Farmville, and I'm pretty sure my wife is dating a guy she reconnected with from high school. Facebook is everywhere, so it seemed like this IPO was the opportunity to get in on the ground floor of something huge.

Sad to say, but I grabbed cash from every possible source I can think of -- cleaned out my retirement accounts, the kids' college funds, even sold my senile dad's classic Corvette. All in all, I bought about $380k worth of stock. I figured I'd sell a quarter of it once it got up to $80-90/share, using those profits to revitalize all the funds I borrowed from. I've lost about everything at this point and I have no faith that it's going to recover.

I know this is a solid investment. But I blame Zuckerberg for pricing it irresponsibly high and ripping off us little guys to fill his already overflowing pockets. I hope he dies young in some frivilous manner, like a hang gliding accident or attempting to summit Mount Everest or swimming with a pack of dolphins. He ripped us off and fate is going to pay him back ten fold.

I'm broken. Knowing that, please reconsider before you post hate speech toward the early FB investors. We were cheated out of our paydays by unscrupulous banks and the insensitivity of Zuckerberg. I can only hope that the banks repay me all that I've lost and then some after the class action suits start coming at them. And if they fail to honor that minimum request, then I think the government should be on the hook to pay me back. I've lost everything through no fault of my own, so somebody needs to pay up.

I know it sounds cliche, but I am the 99%.

Cubicle Jockey:
People who became rich because they found a need among the populace and filled it? Why would you hate or distrust them?

Hate and distrust everybody. Especially you.

They have no product except getting people to click on things, and investors are supposed to like them?

over-valued.

Lord Farkwad: Ha Ha!

This, this, and this again.

Oh, so you all are laughing at "regular" people who tried to use their money to make more money? Do you have something against capitalism? Oh, but they're stupider than me because they thought they'd make money, but I was smart enough to Hurr durr hurr. That's weak, too. If you've got the midas touch then why isn't your ass on Wall Street? Of course there was a chance that there would be some short term losses. I heard a dozen experts say that you should not buy the stock unless you were in it for the long haul. So, many of these people probably expected some volatility. Why does anyone find pleasure in seeing them lose money? I'm really curious.

Can't you block Facebook ads just the same as you can in a browser?

/not a user

PawisBetlog: Once this blows over I bet we're going to see a nice bump. If it drops down into the 25-27 range I'm probably going to buy

Considering all the sane analysts say it should be at $18 by all rights.. good luck with that.

DROxINxTHExWIND: I'm far from a Republican, but there IS a lot of rich folk hatred going on nawadays. Kid quit college to build a website that your ass can't live without and you want to see him fail. Smh. I'm sure they'll bounce back.

I got no problem with Zuck making money; my problem is with the people dumb enough to give their money to him.

DROxINxTHExWIND: I'm far from a Republican, but there IS a lot of rich folk hatred going on nawadays. Kid quit college to build a website that your ass can't live without and you want to see him fail. Smh. I'm sure they'll bounce back.

That a fact? Would the "website that your ass can't live without" include the one that I never visit voluntarily and only setup a dummy account on so I could continue to comment anonymously on random news sites? Seems like I could, in fact, live without it as so far the only purpose it has served is that of an annoyance. And as far as mister "I'm going to build a website taking advantage of the ignorance of the lemmings", yeah, he can fail right off a bridge as far as I'm concerned.

CheekyMonkey: DROxINxTHExWIND: I'm far from a Republican, but there IS a lot of rich folk hatred going on nawadays. Kid quit college to build a website that your ass can't live without and you want to see him fail. Smh. I'm sure they'll bounce back.

NewsFlash: If your ass can't live without Facebook, you're a complete retard.

I think I'll make a facebook page for my ass, and see.

dywed88: PawisBetlog: abfalter: A few rich people skimmed out a lot of stupid peoples money off of this. It was so predictable.

so you think they shorted it? The usual way rich people skim off stupid people's money is having the underwriter give them shares at the open price before the IPO, then when the frenzy of the masses to get shares is at its highest, the rich folks sell.

There was no opportunity for that to happen here, so I'm actually thinking some rich people got hosed, and are pretty pissed at their bankers right now.

We'll see where it goes from here.

Also whoever said it will get down to 8-10, I believe you're high as a kite, but we'll see what happens.

There was that opportunity. Not as good as some stocks, but as I recall it was at around $45 on the first day of trading when the big push occurred. And, yeah, I bet there was a lot shorted because it was plain that the $38 price was too high.

You are right, it won't get down to $10, but I could easily see it hitting the low $20s

DROxINxTHExWIND: I'm far from a Republican, but there IS a lot of rich folk hatred going on nawadays. Kid quit college to build a website that your ass can't live without and you want to see him fail. Smh. I'm sure they'll bounce back.

Considering I can't recall the last time I used Facebook, I think I can live without it. My issue isn't some guy getting rich, he deserves it, but the valuation was ridiculous and the people that tried to justify it "but so many people use the site" deserve to lose any money they put up. As the article says, the question isn't is FB valuable, but how valuable. The best thing about this is that it shows the social media bubble may not be that bad, if FB had ballooned I would have been very scared for the future.

Your recollection that it hit 45? What, at 10:00:01am on the first day of trading? It didn't sniff near that price any other time and was trading at 33.29 within an hour of the opening bell on the day of the IPO.

This stock was way overvalued. (by at least 4x) There's a lot of suckers out there who were revisiting the irrational exuberance of the mid-90's

Cubicle Jockey: People who became rich because they found a need among the populace and filled it? Why would you hate or distrust them?

I don't know about hate, but common sense dictates there would be distrust. Does it not occur to people like you that the rich and the poor have differing needs and are going to, on some level, hold animosity toward one another as a result? It's only natural that people with clashing interests are going to clash.

In fact, one of the biggest problems with our society right now is that the rich have managed to convince a lot of middle and lower class people NOT to distrust them and that has allowed them to institute numerous policies and protections that are in direct opposition to the interests of the middle class and poor. The classes SHOULD fight to some extent. There shouldn't be hatred (although the out-of-control nature of America's wealthiest is rapidly breeding resentment which will lead to that), but I'm not going to trust that somebody like, say, Mitt Romney, has my interests at heart because he doesn't because he can't.

That's just normal human behavior.

Can someone check my math?

If I shorted $200,000 worth of shares on day one (at $38/share), and cashed out today at $29/share... my profit would've been around $40,000 right?

...either way I should've shorted it, sonofabiatch

JackieRabbit: This is precisely what happened. The people who are losing the most money on this are retail investors. Worse, derivative trading of FB started yesterday, so we can expect that their worthless stock is going to be rolled into our 401(k)s, mutual funds and other derived investment instruments. So, just like with the mortgage crisis, we're gonna get farked again.

I honestly believe they won't stop until everybody else has nothing.

Splinshints: Cubicle Jockey: People who became rich because they found a need among the populace and filled it? Why would you hate or distrust them?

I don't know about hate, but common sense dictates there would be distrust. Does it not occur to people like you that the rich and the poor have differing needs and are going to, on some level, hold animosity toward one another as a result? It's only natural that people with clashing interests are going to clash.

Not only that, but the inherent power imbalance is going to ensure that one side has its needs met much more frequently than the other. Money is power and power and corrupts. Age and wisdom can help temper that somewhat, but when you have some young shiat like Zuckerberg that has made billions off the stupidity of the masses I can find no reason to trust him whatsoever.

spentmiles: I cringe at these threads and all the negative forecasts. Sorry to say, but I bought into this hook, line, and sinker. Now all I can think about is the Golden Gate Bridge and the chilly waters far below.

Everywhere I go I see people using Facebook -- the checkout lady is too busy updating her status to attend to my groceries, my kids pretty much ignore me while playing Farmville, and I'm pretty sure my wife is dating a guy she reconnected with from high school. Facebook is everywhere, so it seemed like this IPO was the opportunity to get in on the ground floor of something huge.

Sad to say, but I grabbed cash from every possible source I can think of -- cleaned out my retirement accounts, the kids' college funds, even sold my senile dad's classic Corvette. All in all, I bought about $380k worth of stock. I figured I'd sell a quarter of it once it got up to $80-90/share, using those profits to revitalize all the funds I borrowed from. I've lost about everything at this point and I have no faith that it's going to recover.

I know this is a solid investment. But I blame Zuckerberg for pricing it irresponsibly high and ripping off us little guys to fill his already overflowing pockets. I hope he dies young in some frivilous manner, like a hang gliding accident or attempting to summit Mount Everest or swimming with a pack of dolphins. He ripped us off and fate is going to pay him back ten fold.

I'm broken. Knowing that, please reconsider before you post hate speech toward the early FB investors. We were cheated out of our paydays by unscrupulous banks and the insensitivity of Zuckerberg. I can only hope that the banks repay me all that I've lost and then some after the class action suits start coming at them. And if they fail to honor that minimum request, then I think the government should be on the hook to pay me back. I've lost everything through no fault of my own, so somebody needs to pay up.

I know it sounds cliche, but I am the 99%.

3/10

Splinshints: DROxINxTHExWIND: I'm far from a Republican, but there IS a lot of rich folk hatred going on nawadays. Kid quit college to build a website that your ass can't live without and you want to see him fail. Smh. I'm sure they'll bounce back.

Actually, I despise Facebook and I'm tired of my idiot family members annoying me with requests to join it. I think its a sad commentary on modern life that building such an idiotic thing was such an easy path to success and I think it says a lot about just how simple-minded and short-sighted most people are that it's so "necessary" to nearly a billion drooling dolts.

That being said, Mark Zuckerberg isn't the problem here, the problem is the money men who used the FB IPO as an opportunity to scam gullible idiots. Zuckerberg isn't the one who set the price, he's not the one who ran around comparing it to Google, he's not the one who pulled the rug out from under all the initial small investors.

So, yea, as it's a day that ends in 'y', the real problem here is the out-of-control bankers who just ran another bait and switch on "main street" and will not only get away with it, but be rewarded richly for their malicious con.

kab: I CAN'T BELIEVE THAT INVESTING IN SOMETHING THAT DOESN'T ACTUALLY PRODUCE ANYTHING WAS A BAD IDEA.

Oh, look, another person who doesn't understand the concept of a service industry....

PawisBetlog: I can't believe you're not an investment banker given how much more you know than the guys who you know, actually stake their careers on accurately pricing the stock.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say you probably have no idea how incredibly and stupidly ironic that comment is in a thread about the Facebook IPO....

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that you're a condescending, contrarian jackass. Wait, that's not much of a limb. Clearly your commentary on Facebook's stock price is objective and not at all influenced by the fact that you "despise" it.

Personally I find it an awesome way to keep in touch with friends and family that, for me at least, are spread out across the country. I guess they could just e-mail pictures to everyone all the time, but FB seems like a more effective way.

\bitter, party of one

Ooops. Seems my recollection needs work. (that was Monday the 21st that it was trading at 32.39 within an hour of the bell)

Regardless, this dog has some serious fleas.

spentmiles: I cringe at these threads and all the negative forecasts. Sorry to say, but I bought into this hook, line, and sinker. Now all I can think about is the Golden Gate Bridge and the chilly waters far below.

Everywhere I go I see people using Facebook -- the checkout lady is too busy updating her status to attend to my groceries, my kids pretty much ignore me while playing Farmville, and I'm pretty sure my wife is dating a guy she reconnected with from high school. Facebook is everywhere, so it seemed like this IPO was the opportunity to get in on the ground floor of something huge.

Sad to say, but I grabbed cash from every possible source I can think of -- cleaned out my retirement accounts, the kids' college funds, even sold my senile dad's classic Corvette. All in all, I bought about $380k worth of stock. I figured I'd sell a quarter of it once it got up to $80-90/share, using those profits to revitalize all the funds I borrowed from. I've lost about everything at this point and I have no faith that it's going to recover.

I know this is a solid investment. But I blame Zuckerberg for pricing it irresponsibly high and ripping off us little guys to fill his already overflowing pockets. I hope he dies young in some frivilous manner, like a hang gliding accident or attempting to summit Mount Everest or swimming with a pack of dolphins. He ripped us off and fate is going to pay him back ten fold.

I'm broken. Knowing that, please reconsider before you post hate speech toward the early FB investors. We were cheated out of our paydays by unscrupulous banks and the insensitivity of Zuckerberg. I can only hope that the banks repay me all that I've lost and then some after the class action suits start coming at them. And if they fail to honor that minimum request, then I think the government should be on the hook to pay me back. I've lost everything through no fault of my own, so somebody needs to pay up.

I know it sounds cliche, but I am the 99%.

How have you lost everything when the stock is still worth about $30 a share? That's unpossible.

/ 2/10

stevie1der:

If you believe this strongly, is there anything to keep you or any other Joe Schmoe on the street from short selling a bunch of shares right now and making a lot of money? I'm honestly curious as to how this works.

You could, but I personally never short. There's an old maxim: the market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent. Personally, I think this stock is worth around $12-16 which is inline with valuation, though I believe it could have conceivably shot up to $50 on day one. That's the nature of hype. I keep my money away from hype.

sure haven't: Can someone check my math?

If I shorted $200,000 worth of shares on day one (at $38/share), and cashed out today at $29/share... my profit would've been around $40,000 right?

...either way I should've shorted it, sonofabiatch

$47,368 or so

It was very difficult to short in the early going as not many brokers had positions to lend. Options just started trading yesterday. High relative open interest on the Jul 25 puts.

CruJones: How have you lost everything when the stock is still worth about $30 a share? That's unpossible.

/ 2/10

The second line combined with the second-to-last line kindof give it away.

You know if I was a conspiracy nut, I'd think it was a trick to keep mid and lower-tiered kids in FB.

See, some people (who own parts of it) got STOCK. They made money. Their assets are now liquid and they can sell them at a huge profit because they were priced at dollars on the penny. So the first ten people who worked there, and a few angels.

The people who didn't invest in the company (with labor or cash) might have OPTIONS. This means that they were probably given the legal right to buy stock from the company itself for a guaranteed price. When the stock price gets above a certain level, this means they make money. If it doesn't, then the options are worthless.

Oh look....spentmilesonbullshiatstories has introduced himself to the masses. Guess TFD finally got sick of your schtick.

It's still overvalued.

And I love it that when you lose billions due to bad investments, you can sue. But if you make billions, then everything is fine.

Assets before the IPO plus the cash raised in the IPO probably have the book value at around $10/share. As long as FB doesn't go on an unwise buying spree, that's probably an absolute floor for the stock, but it would only get that low if everyone lost faith in the profitability of the company...which isn't going to happen anytime soon.

A reasonable entry point is probably around $20 IMHO.

Cubicle Jockey: bwilson27: There should always be a deep distrust and general hatred towards the rich, in any society.

People who became rich through crony capitalism or though the parasitic finance industry? Sure. Hate them all you want.

People who became rich because they found a need among the populace and filled it? Why would you hate or distrust them?

Because this is fark, the land of the lazy. If we worked harder instead of posting here we could be wealthier, but it's easier to generalize and call rich people parasites.

CruJones: spentmiles: I cringe at these threads and all the negative forecasts. Sorry to say, but I bought into this hook, line, and sinker. Now all I can think about is the Golden Gate Bridge and the chilly waters far below.

Everywhere I go I see people using Facebook -- the checkout lady is too busy updating her status to attend to my groceries, my kids pretty much ignore me while playing Farmville, and I'm pretty sure my wife is dating a guy she reconnected with from high school. Facebook is everywhere, so it seemed like this IPO was the opportunity to get in on the ground floor of something huge.

Sad to say, but I grabbed cash from every possible source I can think of -- cleaned out my retirement accounts, the kids' college funds, even sold my senile dad's classic Corvette. All in all, I bought about $380k worth of stock. I figured I'd sell a quarter of it once it got up to $80-90/share, using those profits to revitalize all the funds I borrowed from. I've lost about everything at this point and I have no faith that it's going to recover.

I know this is a solid investment. But I blame Zuckerberg for pricing it irresponsibly high and ripping off us little guys to fill his already overflowing pockets. I hope he dies young in some frivilous manner, like a hang gliding accident or attempting to summit Mount Everest or swimming with a pack of dolphins. He ripped us off and fate is going to pay him back ten fold.

I'm broken. Knowing that, please reconsider before you post hate speech toward the early FB investors. We were cheated out of our paydays by unscrupulous banks and the insensitivity of Zuckerberg. I can only hope that the banks repay me all that I've lost and then some after the class action suits start coming at them. And if they fail to honor that minimum request, then I think the government should be on the hook to pay me back. I've lost everything through no fault of my own, so somebody needs to pay up.

I know it sounds cliche, but I am the 99%.
...

because 24% = 100%. Duh.

StrangeQ: That a fact? Would the "website that your ass can't live without" include the one that I never visit voluntarily and only setup a dummy account on so I could continue to comment anonymously on random news sites?

To be fair, every account you set up is a dummy account.

lucksi: It's still overvalued.

And I love it that when you lose billions due to bad investments, you can sue. But if you make billions, then everything is fine.

it was a bad investment at $38, it's a bad investment at $29. It's probably still a bad investment at $20. That doesn't change the fact that MS and other syndicate members who adjusted earnings expectations were not forthcoming in updating the financials for all their clients

PawisBetlog:

Personally I find it an awesome way to keep in touch with friends and family that, for me at least, are spread out across the country. I guess they could just e-mail pictures to everyone all the time, but FB seems like a more effective way.

\bitter, party of one


LOL. This. My father and my sister's family are all 600+miles away in Atlanta. I can log on and find out what they're doing, where they've been and see recent photos of them. I have a lot of high school buddies that I'd never have seen again who 0I linked back up with. Yeah, I know, all Farkers had horrible high school experiences and so you never want to see those people again. Whatever.

PawisBetlog:

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that you're a condescending, contrarian jackass. Wait, that's not much of a limb. Clearly your commentary on Facebook's stock price is objective and not at all influenced by the fact that you "despise" it.

Personally I find it an awe ...

I use it too, just like I used a Qualcomm handset when the stock was valued at $600 a share. Here's the problem with FB, even at today's price, the P/E is 92.31. The P/E of Apple is 13.95. The P/E of Google is 18.02. FB has to start making a lot more money to justify it's valuation. Everyone is buying on the hope that FB will eventually find a way to make money. How will it do that?

DROxINxTHExWIND: Oh, so you all are laughing at "regular" people who tried to use their money to make more money? Do you have something against capitalism? Oh, but they're stupider than me because they thought they'd make money, but I was smart enough to Hurr durr hurr. That's weak, too. If you've got the midas touch then why isn't your ass on Wall Street? Of course there was a chance that there would be some short term losses. I heard a dozen experts say that you should not buy the stock unless you were in it for the long haul. So, many of these people probably expected some volatility. Why does anyone find pleasure in seeing them lose money? I'm really curious.

People are laughing because it's Facebook.

Ma and Pa didn't buy into GE or IBM here, then get their money temporarily eaten by a market swing. The people investing in FB threw their money into a hole that has no long-term prospects. It was a farce from the very beginning.

Facebook is yet another tech fad. We've seen crap like this before. Eventually FB will run out of suckersadvertisers and go the way of MySpace, Livejournal, Friendster, etc. It's a "product" that can't effectively be monetized.

People who bought-in were either trying to game the system (successfully or not), or complete bozos.

ChrisDe: Can't you block Facebook ads just the same as you can in a browser?

/not a user

Yes. Back when I still used FB, I forgot it even had ads.

Splinshints: Actually, I despise Facebook and I'm tired of my idiot family members annoying me with requests to join it. I think its a sad commentary on modern life that building such an idiotic thing was such an easy path to success and I think it says a lot about just how simple-minded and short-sighted most people are that it's so "necessary" to nearly a billion drooling dolts.

Gosh it must be tough being so tragically hip and too cool for this planet upon which you are stranded.

Don't you have to be to the Hipster Eye-Rolling gym in like 26 minutes?!?!?

lemurs: CruJones: How have you lost everything when the stock is still worth about $30 a share? That's unpossible.

/ 2/10

The second line combined with the second-to-last line kindof give it away.

Heavy margin and no real assets to cover it?

Splinshints: DROxINxTHExWIND: I'm far from a Republican, but there IS a lot of rich folk hatred going on nawadays. Kid quit college to build a website that your ass can't live without and you want to see him fail. Smh. I'm sure they'll bounce back.

Actually, I despise Facebook and I'm tired of my idiot family members annoying me with requests to join it. I think its a sad commentary on modern life that building such an idiotic thing was such an easy path to success and I think it says a lot about just how simple-minded and short-sighted most people are that it's so "necessary" to nearly a billion drooling dolts.

That being said, Mark Zuckerberg isn't the problem here, the problem is the money men who used the FB IPO as an opportunity to scam gullible idiots. Zuckerberg isn't the one who set the price, he's not the one who ran around comparing it to Google, he's not the one who pulled the rug out from under all the initial small investors.

So, yea, as it's a day that ends in 'y', the real problem here is the out-of-control bankers who just ran another bait and switch on "main street" and will not only get away with it, but be rewarded richly for their malicious con.

kab: I CAN'T BELIEVE THAT INVESTING IN SOMETHING THAT DOESN'T ACTUALLY PRODUCE ANYTHING WAS A BAD IDEA.

Oh, look, another person who doesn't understand the concept of a service industry....

this is what i don't really understand & lord knows i'm no econo expert - but my boss prances around here like he is and he keeps prattling on about it.

surely facebook can't be the sole company to buy stock in that doesn't manufacture an item???

/awaiting to get learned

Debeo Summa Credo:

Because this is fark, the land of the lazy. If we worked harder instead of posting here we could be wealthier, but it's easier to generalize and call rich people parasites.

Nah, Fark has nothing to do with it.

inner ted: Splinshints: DROxINxTHExWIND: I'm far from a Republican, but there IS a lot of rich folk hatred going on nawadays. Kid quit college to build a website that your ass can't live without and you want to see him fail. Smh. I'm sure they'll bounce back.

Actually, I despise Facebook and I'm tired of my idiot family members annoying me with requests to join it. I think its a sad commentary on modern life that building such an idiotic thing was such an easy path to success and I think it says a lot about just how simple-minded and short-sighted most people are that it's so "necessary" to nearly a billion drooling dolts.

That being said, Mark Zuckerberg isn't the problem here, the problem is the money men who used the FB IPO as an opportunity to scam gullible idiots. Zuckerberg isn't the one who set the price, he's not the one who ran around comparing it to Google, he's not the one who pulled the rug out from under all the initial small investors.

So, yea, as it's a day that ends in 'y', the real problem here is the out-of-control bankers who just ran another bait and switch on "main street" and will not only get away with it, but be rewarded richly for their malicious con.

kab: I CAN'T BELIEVE THAT INVESTING IN SOMETHING THAT DOESN'T ACTUALLY PRODUCE ANYTHING WAS A BAD IDEA.

Oh, look, another person who doesn't understand the concept of a service industry....

this is what i don't really understand & lord knows i'm no econo expert - but my boss prances around here like he is and he keeps prattling on about it.

surely facebook can't be the sole company to buy stock in that doesn't manufacture an item???

/awaiting to get learned

my apologies for the uncontrolled italics

But, it's only a paper loss.

Am I doing this right?

Leaver Zuckerberg Alone!

DROxINxTHExWIND: This is just plain old, "that guy has more money, so fark him" snark. Its pretty weak. No one has ever been able to explain what the creator of Facebook has done to deserve it. I'm done white-knighting, now.

You mean "black-knighting", don't you?

If the stock price continues to fall I would not be surprised to see an announcement for either requiring everyone on Facebook to pay or for a paid "VIP" service.

CruJones: Just shut up already. Stocks sometimes go down after an IPO. And they're not all winners. It's how the market works. It's like everyone just expected to buy some shares and next week they'd be millionaires.

We went public about 4 years ago, at $12.50 I think. Next day $10. Some time in the next year we were around $4 a share. We're now over $50. If you believe in Facebook, hold it. If you don't, you shouldn't have bought it in the first place. I will buy some if it goes much lower.

You know how I know you really don't know much about this? FB and the underwriters knew well in advance that the stock's issue price was way overblown. FB's issue price should have been around $5 to $10 max. They knew that FB's earnings potential was way overstated and informed only a few choice investors just prior to the opening of trading. They didn't get it wrong. The defrauded investors. Hide and watch. Some people are probably going to go to jail over this. Unfortunately it won't be the ones who should go to jail.

JackieRabbit: Some people are probably going to go to jail over this.

That would be a nice change of pace.