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Facebook To Put Off IPO Until Late 2012
jfruhlinger writes "Facebook's whispered about IPO is one of the most anticipated in the industry — but it looks like we'll have to anticipate it for a bit longer. The Financial Times, quoting anonymous sources, says that it won't happen until late next year. Those sources say the purpose is to keep Facebook employees focused on product development, but it seems more likely that Facebook's bankers aren't happy with the company's numbers (or the economy's prospects)."
For all the privacy they've squashed and all the censorship they've jack booted.
Some of the issues are collected here http://stallman.org/facebook.html
Doesn't matter. They've benefitted from it already, and without that pesky regulation stuff. The sold a big chunk of (massively overvalued) shares to Goldman Sachs, who then sold shares in a fund backed by Facebook shares. Because GS was the only shareholder, they didn't pass the threshold required to go public (and so have to publish accounts). Facebook got a big chunk of capital, GS got a new to you play their hype-and-dump games with, a load of rich people got to buy in early and enjoy the bubble, and a load of other people will get left holding the hot potato when they eventually revalue the fund to be based on something sane.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
I've been in a tech company that was poised for an IPO just before the sub-prime bubble burst and rained on everyone's parade. An external firm was brought in to handle it, took one look at the books, and told us that we were, to paraphrase only very slightly, having a laugh.
A business model based on growing on private investment rather than revenue, vastly over-inflated self estimate of worth, and years of accounting sleights of hand were easily rooted out.
Sight unseen, I'd suspect - OK, to be honest, hope - that Facebook is in a similar situation. They may have to go through a few firms before they find out willing to take them to market with a multi billion dollar cap and a straight face.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
To be honest it's a pain. It's blocked from just about every work place and even after you've clocked off and you want to go drinking all the info is locked away. The phone app is so invasive I've un-installed it and make do with awful webpages they serve up on mobile.
I book people for events and people book me for events and to be honest, it's one more point of contact that I could do without. It's best use is for one to many dissemination of information. For many to many it is dire; but as so many people are on, it I'm stuck with it. It has a long way to go and I'm looking forward to the next company that steps over it with something better. Getting everyone to move will make that hard.
I hate the Facebook, try as I might I've had zero success in migrating my family and friends to superior services like twitter & google+. (I'm gen x btw). Reason being is my non computer literate family and friends can't cope with the cognitive dissonance of learning yet another www site on the internet. If they do manage to do so, then there's no-one there, except boring self-promoters (hello twitter!). So Facebook will be around for a long time to come and people like me who know there's better alternatives will still be forced to use it.
Getting back on topic, postponing the IPO makes a tonne of sense. The markets are in turmoil with Greece and Italy about to default. For an IPO of the size of Facebook, any sensible banker would wait and see.
Plus the USA has its election next year, so inevitably the pork barrel will come out. No doubt that will add a couple of digits to the user/revenue/ebitda mulitple that Facebook will be valued at.
I'll see your hokum and raise you a boondoggle.
If anything, Facebook has made it much harder for me to stay in touch with friends and relatives.
Not being a social type, and having a taboo-strength aversion to any conversation in which I only know one of the parties, I'm just not Facebook compatible.
So I rely on e-mail for communication. But with the advent of Facebook, people no longer check their e-mails, nor bother to reply. So I lose touch with people.
I'm sure Facebook is great for those who are social. But it's crippling for those of us who can't cope with social situations.
This is going to be a tough one. Google has already changed the game and Facebook is squirming. I see mainstream news stories about Facebook adding new features that copy Google+. Bankers have advisers who see this kind of thing happening. Frankly, any brokerages/banks willing to float the IPO are looking for an IMMEDIATE payoff (i.e. stripping new "investors" of their buy-in of common stock). Read the "Wall Street Jungle", its an old book the explains this stuff in a simple manner. It is not magic. Plus, the MySpace fiasco is still fresh in everyone's mind. It was SOOO hot!
I object to power without constructive purpose. --Spock