Is Facebook Worth $100 Billion?

[alfred russel]

What's the point of going public if you don't care about investors?

Apparently he didn't have much of a choice...once you cross a certain number of shareholders you have to file, and facebook was at that limit for a while, with a bunch of early investors/workers that had stock options to exercise.

[garbon]

What's the point of going public if you don't care about investors?

Apparently he didn't have much of a choice...once you cross a certain number of shareholders you have to file, and facebook was at that limit for a while, with a bunch of early investors/workers that had stock options to exercise.

Gotcha, gotcha. I was wondering if there was something like that.

[Barrister]

What's the point of going public if you don't care about investors?

Apparently he didn't have much of a choice...once you cross a certain number of shareholders you have to file, and facebook was at that limit for a while, with a bunch of early investors/workers that had stock options to exercise.

Gotcha, gotcha. I was wondering if there was something like that.

Plus some of the early VC wanted to cash out, I think.

[alfred russel]

I kind of admire Zuckerberg for not really wanting to go public, and then taking a "who gives a fuck" attitude toward the whole thing when he had to. Although now he is getting sued by half the law firms in new york and is getting a ton of bad press. Our country sucks sometimes.

[garbon]

I kind of admire Zuckerberg for not really wanting to go public, and then taking a "who gives a fuck" attitude toward the whole thing when he had to. Although now he is getting sued by half the law firms in new york and is getting a ton of bad press. Our country sucks sometimes.

I'm not sure I admire the attitude bit. If you're going to have to do something, do it well - otherwise you're just fucking over lots of other people.

[Eddie Teach]

I'm not sure I admire the attitude bit. If you're going to have to do something, do it well - otherwise you're just fucking over lots of other people.

The people fucked over were those who thought Facebook was worth over a hundred billion for some reason. They should probably just stay out of the stock market altogether.

[alfred russel]

I kind of admire Zuckerberg for not really wanting to go public, and then taking a "who gives a fuck" attitude toward the whole thing when he had to. Although now he is getting sued by half the law firms in new york and is getting a ton of bad press. Our country sucks sometimes.

I'm not sure I admire the attitude bit. If you're going to have to do something, do it well - otherwise you're just fucking over lots of other people.

He owned a controlling stake in the company, and was always upfront that priority one wasn't maximizing profits. When regulatory requirements made it basically mandatory to go public, he made a rather public show that it was going to be on his own terms, he was going to keep a controlling stake in the company and effectively not be answerable to anyone else, and was going to run the company according to what he valued rather than just providing cash returns to shareholders.

The people getting "fucked over" really only have themselves to blame. That is my opinion at least.

[The Brain]

Who was fucked over?

[garbon]

I kind of admire Zuckerberg for not really wanting to go public, and then taking a "who gives a fuck" attitude toward the whole thing when he had to. Although now he is getting sued by half the law firms in new york and is getting a ton of bad press. Our country sucks sometimes.

I'm not sure I admire the attitude bit. If you're going to have to do something, do it well - otherwise you're just fucking over lots of other people.

He owned a controlling stake in the company, and was always upfront that priority one wasn't maximizing profits. When regulatory requirements made it basically mandatory to go public, he made a rather public show that it was going to be on his own terms, he was going to keep a controlling stake in the company and effectively not be answerable to anyone else, and was going to run the company according to what he valued rather than just providing cash returns to shareholders.

The people getting "fucked over" really only have themselves to blame. That is my opinion at least.

Weren't various employees given stock? Kinda sucks for them.

[derspiess]

Who was fucked over?

People who bought into the IPO, or paid anything near the opening price.  But then I agree with AR in that they really fucked themselves over if they didn't think Facebook was overvalued.

[Barrister]

I did think of that.  Declining stock price makes stock options not so valuable.

But I think it's better to say that Zuckerberg doesn't care about short-term share price.  He's clearly dedicated to growing FB, which in the end will increase stock value.

[alfred russel]

Weren't various employees given stock? Kinda sucks for them.

Not really, I doubt many of them are hurting right now. But in any event, if they want stock based compensation and aren't happy with the company's mission statement and leadership, they are always able to move to a more stockholder friendly company, or at least theoretically negotiate a compensation package that isn't stock based.

[The Brain]

Who was fucked over?

People who bought into the IPO, or paid anything near the opening price.  But then I agree with AR in that they really fucked themselves over if they didn't think Facebook was overvalued.

Yes, I don't believe they were fucked over.

[garbon]

Weren't various employees given stock? Kinda sucks for them.

Not really, I doubt many of them are hurting right now. But in any event, if they want stock based compensation and aren't happy with the company's mission statement and leadership, they are always able to move to a more stockholder friendly company, or at least theoretically negotiate a compensation package that isn't stock based.

http://www.businessinsider.com/dear-facebook-employees-heres-the-truth-about-your-stock-price-2012-8

And the stock price is now well below the level at which most employees have been granted stock in the past 18 months.
This means that most current and former Facebook employees are worth far less than they were a few months ago.
Facebook's stock crash is also hurting morale at the company, and damaging perception of the company's business and brand. The impact is big enough that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who has been crystal clear about his desire to ignore the stock price, admitted at a company meeting that the stock crash has been "painful" for everyone.

Rest of article is about putting that into perspective for current employees - but it isn't hard to see that Z's devil may care attitude is painful for those below him - as in fact he said it himself.

As to the rest of what you said - that just further points out that he isn't doing such a great job if employees should leave to get better compensation...

[alfred russel]

My company focuses on shareholder return, so any facebook employee that wants to trade their equity compensation for mine the last few years is welcome to do so. 

The past year or so aside, Facebook has done incredibly well for its employees.