I am buying Facebook. I bought Apple when it came out and people called my stupid. Yes I am now a rich stupid guy. Don’t buy Facebook I don’t care but trust me I will get even richer. I am excited about the opportunity. People actually tried to talk me out of buying Walmart, McDonald’s and Apple among others. Get out of my portfolio people. However, I would recommend not letting this opportunity to get away from you. The very people who tell me about how dumb it is to invest in stocks are the very people losing their homes, credit cards with max balances and raiding their 401Ks. We have some serious idiotic people who know NOTHING about money. Sad really.
Assuming both you and Mr. Rogers are on the level, it appears one of you knows something the other doesn’t and/or are better at reading the tea leaves.
Can you elaborate as to why JR is wrong on this one?
If you are a long term investor, have some years to go before retirement, plus have the means and comfort level to take investment risk, the Facebook IPO could pay off as a buy. Also, keep an eye on it and don’t stay in if you don’t have the stomach to weather ups & downs.
Teck stocks, like all stocks have ups & downs and some fail in the long run. AOL once was hot, APPL still is. Above, napscoordinator, lists his winners, he may have another list of losers, I sure have.
I would not buy Facebook...and it comes down to one word:
Myspace
Around 4-5 years ago, Myspace was a juggernaut, with seemingly unlimited growth potential. And if I remember correctly, it was sold at a great loss (I think by Rupert Murdoch?).
I recently read a study about the rate of new sign ons for Facebook...and it indicated a decline in the growth rate. The study also expressed concern over the ‘cool’ factor of facebook, It just isn’t as cool anymore, now that Mom and Dad, and half your aunts and uncles are on it...and this study predicted that some unknown alernative site could steal users, especially up and coming users.
This is just one person’s opinion, which could easily be wrong. I understand that. However, the prediction could just as easily be true...and IMHO, there is very little ‘fall back’. To my knowledge, Facebook does not have much of an inventory of anything, which could theoretically be liquidated. I doubt they have a large ‘book value’, with real property backing up the company’s value...maybe some servers, maybe a headquarters building...but what do I know, maybe they lease. Their value is predicated on the popularity of a website. In one fell swoop, Facebook could be accused of racism, hypocracy, not being ‘Green’ enough, whatever, and their star could fall.
In other words - the value of this company depends on how ‘cool’ it is with the OWS crowd, for the most part. I don’t want to count on these people for anything.
Just my two cents...if you do invest, I hope you prove me wrong. Me - if one of my 401k funds gets a large position in FB, I will try to switch funds...I am that scared of the ‘Myspace factor’.
Don’t buy Facebook thinking you’ll retire on those shares in 20 years, or even 5 years. It’s this month’s collectible tulip.
MySpace was the go-to site before Facebook. The Left’s NewsCorp boycott made that a chump site.
People aren’t happy at Facebook and won’t necessarily be there in 5 years or even 2.
I agree, since I'm one of them (though I'm trying to change that). I have noticed that it's not really taught. You have to seriously seek out the information yourself and plow through the jargon and the complexity. It's not surprising that not many people understand it.
I heard from a friend of mine that when you own stocks today that they don’t send you actual, fisical stocks that you can hold in your hand. They just send you confirmation that you own some stocks...
Is that true???