Anyone bought these recently or at the outset, theyve almost halved in value since initial flotation, so could be worth a punt. I have some spare cash and rather than it going to waste fancy a little investment, anyone got any opinions worth sharing

Go no where near Facebook shares until the site has found a genuine way to make money that isn’t the current advertising. Until that point they are, at very best, speculative.

I know nothing about shares, but with everyone using the app through phones rather than on a pc it does away with all the adverts so I would imagine fb shares can only go down. the time I see adds on there is while using free games.

Does anyone see Facebook still thriving in five years time or will everyone have got bored with it or found something else by then? That’s what I think, and did before the floatation, so think the shares will continue to slide.

OP– you got some spare cash, you like a gamble, try Camelot in the St Leger

theyve almost halved in value since initial flotation, so could be worth a punt

Based on this I’d say the OP knows nothing of investment and should stick to a savings account – or do some research into finding a suitable unit trust.

^ 100% this.

I remember a fella on here who sunk everything he had into Northern Rock based on the share price only being around 40% of it’s previous value.
His reasoning was “it can’t go any lower that 390p after previously being 1100p only a few week earlier”

Never did find out how he got on

Anyone remember myspace?
Anyone?

The only person i have known do well out of falling shares prices was a colleague and he bought shares in Corus when they were 4p each. Bascially the value of the business if scrapped was greater than the share price. He figured it could only go one way, paid his mortgage off and had plenty to spare in the end.

To be fare i bought a few shares at 8p and when TATA bought the business it paid for my first car…

to be fair I am a stock market novice, unit trusts are definitely worth a look in, i think ill wait and see what happens on this as it would be a purely speculative investment and I wouldnt be putting all eggs in one basket so to speak

IanMunro – Member

Anyone remember myspace?

Facebook’s achieved a far higher penetration than Myspace ever did… Here’s a market share thing:

http://www.dreamgrow.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/top-10-social-networking-sites-by-market-share-of-visits-july-2012.png

Suggests they don’t have that much to worry about just now. Not that this makes them a good investment, obviously.

The only person i have known do well out of falling shares prices

I’d have done some kind of spreadbetting or shorting, to gamble on them falling.
So what if they’ve halved. Board of Directors are selling, rather than buying sold stock. I put Facebook in the same league as Yahoo – pretty big, but no real tangible business (at the moment). Number of users is meaningless, and the 900,000,000 active users they claim is IMHO complete poppycock.

Ha! Facebook Schmacebook. I’ve got some Santander shares.
Beat that!

Bascially the value of the business if scrapped was greater than the share price. He figured it could only go one way, paid his mortgage off and had plenty to spare in the end.

That approach fails horribly if shareholders get wiped out in a debt-for-equity swap or anything similar like that.

That approach fails horribly if shareholders get wiped out in a debt-for-equity swap or anything similar like that.

Not the best approach i agree i was just doing a share save which reduced the risk. It worked out, it is one of those knowing the business and there being something physical to sell.

What exactly is Facebook? how does it make its money, if you can answer those questions then maybe buying facebook shares makes sense.

There’s nothing wrong with getting involved with a few speculative shares just for fun – most people who’re into investing do IME. It’s just not the right place to get started. Bit like backing outsiders when you’re on the dole versus when you have a steady income.

That said, Facebook does seem like an enticing punt to me – in that it has the largest quantity of quality consumer information ever assembled in history. It just doesn’t know what to do with it. If all it can come up with is personalised ads that no one reads, then yes it’s basically fked. There’s got to be someone at facebook HQ capable of coming up with a half-decent idea that can improve on this though.

Facebook shares are on a one way trip. Inasanely over hyped flotation driven by Investment banks after a fast buck (ie flog them to someone stupid quickly and pocket the cash). Bad news came out a bit too quick for them to manage this. The revenue in no way justifies the current valuation, let along the price at IPO! You’d be better off buying Lotto tickets.

I remember a fella on here who sunk everything he had into Northern Rock based on the share price only being around 40% of it’s previous value.
His reasoning was “it can’t go any lower that 390p after previously being 1100p only a few week earlier”

Worryingly I did think about doing the same as I thought the Government’s investment guarantee would stop a full blown run on the bank. How wrong I was (and thankfully I didn’t buy any shares).

TBH, if you fancy shares, then you;d be better off investing in the type of shares that mimic bonds in terms of return and security, utilities for example, captive market, requires ongoing investment, recession proof. Sure have a punt of Facebook, but put 95% of your portfolio in something relativley safe, they could be worth 50% of **** all in 2 years time.

There’s still a few lock-up periods in Facebook shares to expire – Clicky. Basically, early investors can’t sell until certain dates – November 13th looks to be the date that over a billion become saleable, with 1/4 billion prior between mid-October & then. If I were to have the desire to buy Facebook shares before 2013, I’d be lying down in a darkened room until the feeling passed…

^^
+1

Facebook’s income comes from advertising AFAIK.
Total worldwide spend on advertising is around $500 billion.
So was Facebook ever really worth $100 billion?
Do the math as they say.

Facebook shares were under pressure after the US financial publication Barron’s said the stock is worth perhaps only $15 a share, well below the $38-a-share flotation price.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-19699205

You might as well take the money out of the bank and set fire to it IMO.

Does anyone see Facebook still thriving in five years time or will everyone have got bored with it or found something else by then? That’s what I think

Yes, it’ll fade into the background/consciousness like google search, e-mail, or just using a phone, it does what it does very well, people use it, hard to imagine that stopping.

Facebook’s income comes from advertising AFAIK.
Total worldwide spend on advertising is around $500 billion.
So was Facebook ever really worth $100 billion?
Do the math as they say.

50% of forum/socialnetworking traffic and vastly more time spent on it than any other website? It just needs to figure out how to show people adverts without driving them away (google search Vs yahoo homepage). Then it (or whatever does, but it’s hard to see another networking tool taking off) will make it’s billions.

Saw the latest dip of FB shares and thought of this thread. Note that other lock-ins are expiring soon, so there will be more potential sellers looking for an upswing to unload on (or whatever is the current argot).

I had an interesting conversation yesterday with a pal who owns and runs an online mag, he’s tried all manner of advertising for his site and in turn offers, rather like STW, online adverts to the kite and bike market and he came up with some Interesting stats (note apple v android users)

One of which was that by far the most effective advertising for him to promote his business, that of attracting the worlds mountain biker and kiters, was Facebook, he gets more return per buck spent with them than any google, exhibition attendance or other promotion.

Now I’ve also heard this from other folks, we did very little to attract Transition owners to the Tr.OG Facebook page, so I wouldn’t write Facebook off just yet. Would I buy shares? Hmm think I might wait for another stock crash and then pile in for the upturn, but then I got so badly burned in the 87 crash I’ve never really invested in shares since.