Google Stock Review

[Snake]

Well today is the first day for Google on the stock market. Started the day at $85 and went to $100, and finished at $100.34. Wonder how long it will last above $100. I guess now only time will tell. Here is an artical i found from The Associated Press.

NEW YORK -- Shares of Google surged nearly 18 percent in their market debut Thursday, in the culmination of a unique and bumpy initial public offering for the 6-year-old dot-com dreamed up in a college dorm room.

The stock started at $100.01 on the Nasdaq Stock Market, $15.01 higher than its $85 initial offering price. Within a few minutes of trading, Google was at $98.08, with 5.5 million shares having traded hands.

The IPO price, set late Wednesday through an unorthodox auction that alienated many on Wall Street, cleared the way for the stock to start trading under the symbol "GOOG."

Founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page opened trading on the Nasdaq, though Google did not begin trading until midday.

Nasdaq officials said a delay in trading was standard for IPOs, and added that there were some technical issues as the Nasdaq matched bid and ask prices in the minutes leading up to trading.

The $85 initial share price was short of Google's original expectation of $108 to $135 a share. It also comes at the lowest end of Google's downward-revised range it made on Wednesday, when it also reduced the number of shares to be sold to 19.6 million from 25.7 million -- a move that was expected to buoy prices.


"The good news for Google is that it didn't price below the low end," said Tom Taulli, co-founder of CurrentOfferings, an IPO research company. "If it had priced below the low end, maybe there could have been some selling pressure."

The IPO raised $1.67 billion. If the stock had priced at the high end of the original estimate, Google would have raised as much as $3.6 billion and given the company a market capitalization as high as $36 billion.

"When you finally cut through the hype, economic rationality wins out," said Bob Clarkson, a securities attorney at the Menlo Park, California-based Jones Day law firm, which did underwriting work for many IPOs, including Yahoo's. "Bidders who wanted to buy the stock have done a reasonably hard-nosed analysis and they say they like $85 better than $108 or $120."

According to Google, pre-IPO shareholders expect to sell 5.5 million shares, less than half the 11.6 million originally planned.

The company itself will sell 14.1 million shares, which is unchanged from previous filings.

The offering eclipses most of the hot tech issues of the 1990s and will make Brin and Page billionaires -- at least on paper. Page collected $41.1 million and Brin got $40.9 million, but that pales in comparison to the more than $3 billion each still holds in Google shares.

The $85 price values the world's most popular search engine at $23.1 billion, more valuable than companies such as Amazon.com, with a market capitalization of $16 billion, and Lucent Technologies, valued at $13.5 billion, but slightly less than General Motors' $23.7 billion.

The company eschewed Wall Street tradition and decided that the final IPO price would be set by an auction. Its founders wrote an idealistic letter in its prospectus, outlining the company's "Don't Be Evil" mantra and plan to avoid the trappings of traditional companies.

But Google has had a bumpy road to the IPO.

In one case, Google said the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission "has requested additional information concerning the publication" of an interview with Brin and Page that appeared in September's issue of Playboy magazine. That was a potential violation of the SEC's rules against talking publicly before an IPO about information that is not included in the prospectus.

Google also has disclosed that the agency has launched an informal inquiry into its issuance of millions of pre-IPO shares and options without registering them.

Snake
(go google go)

[nikkinouse]

Good day for Google - wish I had just made almost 20% on my investment in a day!
It will be interesting to see how high it goes and how some of those mini-scandals play out.

[intelliot]

The IPO price was actually established at $85. From $85 to $100.34 is the 18% increase.

[picknslap]

Google was expecting much more though. Like to close at $135 the two co-founders are now officially billionares. And hundreds of people working at Google are now millionares.

[Snake]

Google Stock (GOOG) started the day off at 100.34 dollars. Had another good day for Google. Went up nearly 8% in its 2nd day of trading on the NASDAQ. Officially it went up 7.95%. It finished the day at 108.31 dollars, up 7.975 dollars. Looking good so far for Google and its stock holders.

Snake
(report by me)

[Snake]

MONDAY, August 23rd, 2004 - DAY 3 - Google Stock (GOOG) started the day off at 108.31 dollars. Google went up for its 3rd day in a row. It went up, but only 1.01%. Not a lot. The stock went up 1.09 dollars, and closed at 109.40 dollars. Still looking good for stock holders of Google. So far in its 3 days of being on the NASDAQ, Google Stock has gone up 24.40 dollars since the IPO was set at 85.00 dollars. Can Google stock keep going up? Or will it go down tomarrow. The drama will unfold tomarrow.

Snake
(google stock report written by me)

[Snake]

TUESDAY, August 24th, 2004 - DAY 4 - Google Stock (GOOG) started the day off at 109.40 dollars. It was the first sad day in Google Stock history. Google went down in price for the first time in its history, well its only the 4th day. It went down 4.14%. Or in dollars it went down 4.53 dollars, and closed the day at 104.87 dollars. This is its first time it went down, but will it continue to go down once it started? We don't know right now, so stay tuned to tomarrows report.

Snake
(google stock report written by me)

[mike]

i think buying google is a bad idea. the price is way too high, and its gonna deteriorate in value imho.

[Snake]

WEDNESDAY, August 25th, 2004 - DAY 5 - Google Stock (GOOG) started the day off at 104.87 dollars. By the end of the day, Google Stock went up 1.13 dollars, and it closed the day at 106.00 dollars. So atleast it recovered alittle bit that it lost in the previous day, and it didn't continue to fall after its first day of a loss in the previous day. Can Google go up two days in a row now? Find out later today.

Snake
(google stock report written by me)

[Snake]

THURSDAY, August 26th, 2004 - DAY 6 - Google Stock (GOOG) started the day off at 106.00 dollars. By the end of the day, Google Stock went up 1.80%. It went up 1.91 dollars, and closed the day at 107.91. That makes Google stock up 2 days in a row. Good sign for Google that the stock is staying up and not going down fast. It will be interesting if Google stock can go up 3 days in a row, it did it once (its first 3 days.)

Google Stock Stats:
Days the price went up: 5
Days the price went down: 1
Curent Streak: +2

Snake
(google stock report written by me)