Baidu Has A Bubble-rific Debut

from the bad-bankers dept

Well, apparently investors didn't care that Baidu is about to lose its main differentiating feature (the ability to download free music and movies). In the pursuit of new dot com bubble mania, investors drove the stock up 354% in its debut (though, actually, it's not clear that number is accurate -- my calculation of the price jumping from $27 to $151 suggests about a 460% increase). We haven't seen that sort of first day bump since the bubble years, so it might be worth breaking out the old IPO lesson for those who have forgotten it. While this sort of news excites people and makes them think that this was a successful IPO, it's actually the opposite. It means the investment bankers did a horrible job of pricing the shares -- leaving a ton of money on the table that should have gone to Baidu, but instead went to people (friends of the investment bankers, of course) who immediately flipped their shares.
Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team


Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  1. identicon
    dorpus, 6 Aug 2005 @ 8:38pm

    The Next Asian Tech Bubble

    There's a new genre of X-rated video games made for women, featuring handsome young men in love with each other. The genre is called "BL" (Boy Love), and a new store specializing in it just opened in Tokyo. We can assume it will be popular among some people here.

    News article: http://www.tokyo-np.co.jp/00/tokuho/20050807/mng_____tokuho__000.shtml

    BL site:
    http://www.arlesnovels.com/

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. identicon
    GunGeek, 8 Aug 2005 @ 7:46am

    How they got 354%

    They used the closing price, not the high for the day. Seems most of the stock market types have a real affinity for the open and close prices. Not sure how they'll handle things when the markets go to 24x7, which will happen one of these days as they get more computerized and more global.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 8 Aug 2005 @ 9:02am

    Re: How they got 354%

    dorpus, you loser, what does that disgusting game have to do with Baidu going public?

    link to this | view in thread ]


Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.