Posted by
ryuzaki0
on from the a-week-for-cobalt dept.
Cobalt's IPO, which was announced a while back, will apparently be this week. The story itself has more information regarding the whole thing for Cobalt, and the market in general.
Perhaps I'm not understanding this.
by
mr
·
· Score: 3
Exactly WHY are companies that are loosing money WORTH all this cash? (Hint: I don't really want to hear all about how the future will be better, and the losses will become profits.)
Every one in the CNN article showed a loss. 94,000 last year, 2.3 million this year and yet this is worth having an IPO over. Boggles MY mind.
I guess if the US government can run a shop where more money is spent than taken in, then why not every one else?
--
If it was said on slashdot, it MUST be true!
Re:Perhaps I'm not understanding this.
by
Coward,+Anonymous
·
· Score: 2
Exactly WHY are companies that are loosing money WORTH all this cash? (Hint: I don't really want to hear all about how the future will be better, and the losses will become profits.)
There are several things to consider when evaluating a company: the value of its trademark(s) and the value of it's intellectual property and physical property. And there is, of course, (cover your ears if you really don't want to hear this) the potential for future profits.
Re:Perhaps I'm not understanding this.
by
Jahf
·
· Score: 4
I'm biased, very much so, but in the case of Cobalt it's not quite the same as with a ".com" company.
Cobalt has physical real-world product. They aren't selling vaporware. They can show consistent growth both in revenue and in product line.
I'm not saying that they have a value of billions of dollars, but comparisons to some other IPOs over the last year or two where those companies with software or information-based (or worse, vapor-based) are really not fair.
/Jahf
-- It is more productive to voice thoughtful opinions (reply) than to judge (moderate) others.
Re:Perhaps I'm not understanding this.
by
andyschm
·
· Score: 2
A large part of the revenue which these companies claim is based on an usual metric of worth that is very specific to the internet. Example: a site which is participating in a banner exchange network can claim revenue (and loss) based on the number of times their banner loads on the network. It is very weird... but it still makes sense.. it is part of the new economy.
I just "ported" a product to the new Cobalt x86-based system (it's basically RedHat 6.0), and it was very little effort for (what we hope will be) quite a big payoff. The biggest premium in the ISP/NSP world is rack space, and the prospect of having umpteen-gazillion servers in such a confined space is a great idea.
There are some cool technical folks working at Cobalt, and I hope they do well.
Re:There is a problem with IPO's
by
davidu
·
· Score: 5
It seems to me like a lot of people misunderstand what an IPO is.
--Umm yeah, so do you.
If you buy a stock when it balloons to 80 or so, you haven't bought into the IPO; you've bought shares from someone who applied for and got IPO shares for 15 each, and is now selling them to you for 80.
WRONG. I have been in quite a few IPO's and when you are really IN on the IPO, you can't sell until the SEC lockout period ends. That period is usually about 6 months, at which point, if you work for the company you still can't sell all of it.
The way to make money off these things is to watch for the announcements and apply as quickly as possible (you need to fill out a SEC form that says you aren't related to any officers of the company and you know stuff about the market).
--Umm, no. To do that, you need to be on the floor making trades. Since a chair on the exchange (NYSE) goes into the millions these days, I doubt you have one. Maybe you mean your broker does this, but you're still wrong. Your broker usually gets IN on the IPO months before the actual day. (if they can even get in at all)
If you are eligible, you can get shares pretty cheap (usually about 15 dollars) before trading starts.
What are you talking about? The IPO has nothing to do with the low price? It is just where the price starts. The price could start at $400 a share if they wanted. They would just offer a lower float as a result.
Then when it starts trading, if there is significant hype surrounding the company (always the case if it's posted on Slashdot) you'll be able to sell the shares for 5 times what you paid for them very early in the day.
Nope...not for a few months...otherwise everyone would do it.
If you don't get the actual IPO, don't bother trying to buy the stock.
Well, just tell your broker not to pay for than X dollars a share and you _should_ be safe.
If, however, you think the company will be a good long term investment, wait a while to see what happens the the price. It'll probably adjust to a normal price after a few days (a lot of people who get stuck with the stock at the end of the first day don't want to hold onto it).
Yeah...the first true thing you have said.
Just my $.02,
-Davidu
--
# Hack the planet, it's important.
How can i buy IPO stock?
by
Mr+Donkey
·
· Score: 2
I have bought stock through E*trade in the past, but only in stock that had existed for a while. Is there anything special about buying IPO stock, any restrictions?
-- -----Transmission Complete-----
If you want to email me...Don't
Re:How can i buy IPO stock?
by
Anonymous Coward
·
· Score: 2
You generally have to be one of: 1) Know somebody high in the company to give you some friends and family shares. 2) Have tons of wealth so your brokerage gives you some as a perk. 3) If, like E*trade, the brokerage has a lottery to give out shares, you are extremely lucky. 4) Work for the company to get stock options.
There is a problem with IPO's
by
SaxMaster
·
· Score: 5
The real problem with ipo's aside from the inherent risk factor of the stock market is the speed of trade execution. Large brokerages have the advantage, and by the time a normal person buys a stock like Cobalt, the price of 15 has balooned to 80, and then could drop back to something like 60, and you then lose money. I say, stick with companies whose future has little doubt like HP, IBM, Dell and others like Phillip Morris and General Electric. Play it safe.
-- "Dancing is the vertical expression of a horizontal desire" --Robert Frost
Re:There is a problem with IPO's
by
ben.b
·
· Score: 5
It seems to me like a lot of people misunderstand what an IPO is.
If you buy a stock when it balloons to 80 or so, you haven't bought into the IPO; you've bought shares from someone who applied for and got IPO shares for 15 each, and is now selling them to you for 80. The way to make money off these things is to watch for the announcements and apply as quickly as possible (you need to fill out a SEC form that says you aren't related to any officers of the company and you know stuff about the market). If you are eligible, you can get shares pretty cheap (usually about 15 dollars) before trading starts. Then when it starts trading, if there is significant hype surrounding the company (always the case if it's posted on Slashdot) you'll be able to sell the shares for 5 times what you paid for them very early in the day.
If you don't get the actual IPO, don't bother trying to buy the stock. If, however, you think the company will be a good long term investment, wait a while to see what happens the the price. It'll probably adjust to a normal price after a few days (a lot of people who get stuck with the stock at the end of the first day don't want to hold onto it).
Of course, buying into an IPO is risky business, no matter what all the "experts" who cleaned up on RHAT (having opened their E*Trade accounts the previous week) tell you.
Cobalt might be a good long-term. The idea of network appliances like the Cube could very well be the Next Big Thing -- boxes that serve web and don't do anything else are a fairly big step towards simplifying the information environment of a small to medium sized company. The fact that they're using Linux as an underpinning proves only that they know how to be frugal.
That said, we'll have to see how well they're managed before we declare them the next Cisco. What they manage for a line of follow-up products is the Big Question...
----
-- Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
Of course, how biased are these 'experts'? Of course they'll buy stock of their own, tout it as the next big thing, get you to buy in, and sell off before it comes back down to market value (which it generally does, assuming it starts above market, of course!)
The golden rule with investing is: the higher the return, the higher the risk. IPOs may be a great way to make money in the short term. They may equally be a great way to get burnt. Examine your needs and wants and determine what type of company is best for you.
Of course, the way tech stock IPO's have been going recently, it is probably not a bad bet.
Speaking of which, who wants to join in a business venture with me? We will buy a server, set it up, call the company networks.com, IPO, sell to a big company, and make a FORTUNE! Oh wait, I forgot, the company would have to lose money or it wouldn't be worth anything. Oh well.
Re:My stock prediction
by
TurkishGeek
·
· Score: 3
Sorry, please check out their financial situation. Microsoft is literally raking in millions of bucks. With this kind of revenue and growth, short-selling Microsoft is financial suicide. Gates, Ballmer and other MS executives will never allow MS stock to slump since MS completely depends on stock options-it is what's keeping those hordes of programmers there.
You might want to check out their past annual reports, and take a look at recommendations of Wall Street analysts covering the company.
We may not like some of their crappy software and business practices, but the stock price will continue going up since they are obviously doing very well financially. And this is not likely to change overnight. Things would probably be very different if it was the sentiment of Open Source geek community that was driving the stock market, rather than the logic of Wall Street MBA types looking at nothing other than actual numbers and sales figures.
I know why they will do extremely well...
by
Anonymous Coward
·
· Score: 2
They will do extremely well because they have the words "networks" in their name! Almost every IPO in the past few weeks with that name has gone sky high on their opening day. Hopefully some of this gain will be attributed to Linux and put it into the public eye even more. Now it is highly unlikely most of us will be able to profit from this gain but...depending on how prominent Linux is in this IPO, this will bring the other Linux companies into the public eye and boost their stocks a little bit. Of course this is all just my opinion and I could very well be wrong.
If you want fast execution on your orders, you have to pay for it. Thats the downside of using a discount brokerage. For fast execution, try a day trading brokerage like Datek.
OK, so we've got Red Hat, Cobalt, VA, and a while ago I heard rumours of Cygnus, too... now, if you ask me, all these small IPOs are only leading up to one thing...
Transmeta I P O
Yes, that's right. Transmeta's only real product will earn them millions of dollars in a matter of seconds, and it's only three little letters: IPO. No programmable chips, no anti-microsoft ultimate anything, just an IPO. We now know the truth.
-- Windows 2000: Designed for the Internet.
The Internet: Designed for UNIX.
Slashdot Mirror
Exactly WHY are companies that are loosing money WORTH all this cash? (Hint: I don't really want to hear all about how the future will be better, and the losses will become profits.)
Every one in the CNN article showed a loss. 94,000 last year, 2.3 million this year and yet this is worth having an IPO over. Boggles MY mind.
I guess if the US government can run a shop where more money is spent than taken in, then why not every one else?
If it was said on slashdot, it MUST be true!
I just "ported" a product to the new Cobalt x86-based system (it's basically RedHat 6.0), and it was very little effort for (what we hope will be) quite a big payoff. The biggest premium in the ISP/NSP world is rack space, and the prospect of having umpteen-gazillion servers in such a confined space is a great idea.
There are some cool technical folks working at Cobalt, and I hope they do well.
It seems to me like a lot of people misunderstand what an IPO is.
--Umm yeah, so do you.
If you buy a stock when it balloons to 80 or so, you haven't bought into the IPO; you've bought shares from someone who applied for and got IPO shares for 15 each, and is now selling them to you for 80.
WRONG. I have been in quite a few IPO's and when you are really IN on the IPO, you can't sell until the SEC lockout period ends. That period is usually about 6 months, at which point, if you work for the company you still can't sell all of it.
The way to make money off these things is to watch for the announcements and apply as quickly as possible (you need to fill out a SEC form that says you aren't related to any officers of the company and you know stuff about the market).
--Umm, no. To do that, you need to be on the floor making trades. Since a chair on the exchange (NYSE) goes into the millions these days, I doubt you have one. Maybe you mean your broker does this, but you're still wrong. Your broker usually gets IN on the IPO months before the actual day. (if they can even get in at all)
If you are eligible, you can get shares pretty cheap (usually about 15 dollars) before trading starts.
What are you talking about? The IPO has nothing to do with the low price? It is just where the price starts. The price could start at $400 a share if they wanted. They would just offer a lower float as a result.
Then when it starts trading, if there is significant hype surrounding the company (always the case if it's posted on Slashdot) you'll be able to sell the shares for 5 times what you paid for them very early in the day.
Nope...not for a few months...otherwise everyone would do it.
If you don't get the actual IPO, don't bother trying to buy the stock.
Well, just tell your broker not to pay for than X dollars a share and you _should_ be safe.
If, however, you think the company will be a good long term investment, wait a while to see what happens the the price. It'll probably adjust to a normal price after a few days (a lot of people who get stuck with the stock at the end of the first day don't want to hold onto it).
Yeah...the first true thing you have said.
Just my $.02,
-Davidu
# Hack the planet, it's important.
I have bought stock through E*trade in the past, but only in stock that had existed for a while.
Is there anything special about buying IPO stock, any restrictions?
-----Transmission Complete----- If you want to email me...Don't
The real problem with ipo's aside from the inherent risk factor of the stock market is the speed of trade execution. Large brokerages have the advantage, and by the time a normal person buys a stock like Cobalt, the price of 15 has balooned to 80, and then could drop back to something like 60, and you then lose money. I say, stick with companies whose future has little doubt like HP, IBM, Dell and others like Phillip Morris and General Electric. Play it safe.
"Dancing is the vertical expression of a horizontal desire" --Robert Frost
Cobalt might be a good long-term. The idea of network appliances like the Cube could very well be the Next Big Thing -- boxes that serve web and don't do anything else are a fairly big step towards simplifying the information environment of a small to medium sized company. The fact that they're using Linux as an underpinning proves only that they know how to be frugal.
That said, we'll have to see how well they're managed before we declare them the next Cisco. What they manage for a line of follow-up products is the Big Question...
----
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
There's also a Wired article on the subject :
http://www.wired.com/news/b usiness/0,1367,32154,00.html
Sorry, please check out their financial situation. Microsoft is literally raking in millions of bucks. With this kind of revenue and growth, short-selling Microsoft is financial suicide. Gates, Ballmer and other MS executives will never allow MS stock to slump since MS completely depends on stock options-it is what's keeping those hordes of programmers there.
You might want to check out their past annual reports, and take a look at recommendations of Wall Street analysts covering the company.
We may not like some of their crappy software and business practices, but the stock price will continue going up since they are obviously doing very well financially. And this is not likely to change overnight. Things would probably be very different if it was the sentiment of Open Source geek community that was driving the stock market, rather than the logic of Wall Street MBA types looking at nothing other than actual numbers and sales figures.
Zigbee Central: A Zigbee weblog
They will do extremely well because they have the words "networks" in their name! Almost every IPO in the past few weeks with that name has gone sky high on their opening day. Hopefully some of this gain will be attributed to Linux and put it into the public eye even more. Now it is highly unlikely most of us will be able to profit from this gain but...depending on how prominent Linux is in this IPO, this will bring the other Linux companies into the public eye and boost their stocks a little bit. Of course this is all just my opinion and I could very well be wrong.
If you want fast execution on your orders, you have to pay for it. Thats the downside of using a discount brokerage. For fast execution, try a day trading brokerage like Datek.
Transmeta I P O
Yes, that's right. Transmeta's only real product will earn them millions of dollars in a matter of seconds, and it's only three little letters: IPO. No programmable chips, no anti-microsoft ultimate anything, just an IPO. We now know the truth.
Windows 2000: Designed for the Internet. The Internet: Designed for UNIX.