facebook valuation
-
Can Mobile Really Drive a Facebook Stock Rally?
One of the reasons Facebook stock (Nasdaq: FB) hasn't fared better since it started trading - it's off 25% from its $38 IPO price - is the company's failure to profit from increased mobile activity among users.
But now, less than a year after Facebook's acknowledgement that it needed to monetize its growing mobile member usage, the company bills itself as a truly mobile company.
"After initially struggling, Facebook has now mastered mobile, and I think the company has a bright future," CNBC's Jim Cramer said.
The company has made headway in the arena. Mobile monthly active users increased to 680 million in January, up 57% from a year earlier.
And mobile ad revenue tripled from the third to fourth quarter and now comprises 23% of total ad revenue.
"Over the last six months, while the public has pondered its mobile strategy, Facebook has quietly emerged as the superpower of application discovery, and is progressively playing a powerful role in reshaping e-commerce, media and advertising on mobile platforms," wrote All Things D. "Facebook's new products - ranging from open graph and timeline to mobile installs - are reshaping how brands, companies and app developers can connect with their audiences and facilitate discovery in a crowded app world."
More than half of Facebook users now access the site via mobile devices even though the on-the-go site lacks many features included in the PC version.
Nonetheless, the shift has been dynamic and is chipping away at FB's desktop income stream, which generates greater, but now waning, revenue.
All Things D says that as Facebook's mobile infrastructure develops, the social media behemoth is poised to transform mobile's future much like Google's (Nasdaq: GOOG) Adwords changed the face of search.
So does this mean the Facebook stock price will start to reward investors?
-
The Real Reason Mark Zuckerberg is Paying $2 Billion in Taxes on the Facebook IPO
As the much-ballyhooed Facebook IPO looms closer, there's a mountain being made out of a molehill.
Turns out 27-year-old founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg may have a $2 billion tax bill that, according to a variety of sources, he intends to pay in full.
He seems like a regular guy...or is he?
To say I'm skeptical of his intentions would be an insult to actual skeptics. I think the "Zuck" is a great guy, but a regular guy? No way.
He didn't build from scratch a business that has 845 million customers by being stupid.
Zuckerberg goes to great lengths to project an aw-shucks kind of image. But in reality, this move is about as down-to-earth as Kim Kardashian's wedding. And it's every bit as sophisticated a play as I would have expected out of Larry Ellison or the late Steve Jobs.
Zuckerberg (and presumably his advisors) knows that the stakes couldn't be higher than they are at the moment, which is why he wants to pay this tax bill and reinforce the illusion that Facebook is part of Middle America - instead of being built upon its back.
He knows that successfully doing so will help him monetize your information when Facebook goes public.
I say this because it's important to remember the only reason Facebook is worth anything is because users - people like you - have voluntarily, with no compensation whatsoever, assembled the greatest single collection of marketing data in recorded history. That's right. Your data is going to make him rich.
So where are all the privacy advocates now?
I'd love to see what Facebook's proposed valuation would be if 845 million people suddenly decided they really don't want to share their most intimate moments with friends or decide they don't really want to "like" anything.
And why hasn't the Occupy Wall Street crowd or the Tax the Rich bunch latched onto this?
Because evidently none of them can spell h-y-p-o-c-r-i-s-y. And many are probably too busy using Facebook to "meme" about their activities to pay attention anyway.
But that's really beside the point.
A Zuckerberg Tax? ...Give me a Break
There should be a huge amount of backlash, but there isn't. Well, unless you count any number of proposals like the "Zuckerberg Tax" advanced last Tuesday in a New York Times OpEd piece by tax lawyer David Miller.
Miller advocates allowing the government to claw back money from the ultra-wealthy. He believes that individuals earning more than $2.2 million in income or having more than $5.7 million in securities should have their stocks marked to market and taxed even if they haven't sold their investments.
That's asinine.
To continue reading, please click here...
-
Before You Get Excited About the Facebook IPO…
For more than a year there has been rampant speculation about a Facebook IPO, and now it finally appears as though one is on the way.
The social media giant could file papers for an initial public offering as soon as Wednesday, according to a report from The Wall Street Journal. The company is looking at a deal that would value the social media giant between $75 billion and $100 billion, the WSJ reported, making it one of the biggest in U.S. history.
Scott Sweet of IPO Boutique told MarketWatch a Facebook IPO will likely lead to "pandemonium."
"It's absolutely massive," Sweet said in an interview. "The mere drop of a hint will cause pandemonium."
Facebook is looking to raise as much as $10 billion, which would make it the fourth-largest U.S. IPO behind Visa Inc. (NYSE: V), General Motors Co. (NYSE: GM), and AT&T Wireless. A $100 billion valuation would make Facebook worth as much as global powerhouse McDonald's Corp. (NYSE: MCD).
To continue reading, please click here... -
Facebook & Goldman Sachs: Don't Be Fooled by a Facebook IPO
