Tomorrow is the one-year anniversary for the Facebook (FB) IPO … though many investors might not want to remember it.
Shares are down about 31% in that time, compared to a 19% gain for the Dow Jones Industrial Average and a 22% jump in the S&P 500. That’s right — you would’ve done better plunking your money into humdrum companies like General Electric (GE) or Clorox (CLX).
That isn’t to say Facebook has been a completely lost cause. The company has gotten back on track to some extent, improving its revenues last quarter by 36% thanks to an improved focus on monetizing mobile, which went from nothing to 30% of revenues during the past 12 months. Read

A long-time follower of the IPO scene, back in 1999 Tom started one of the first sites in the space called WebIPO. It was a place where investors got research as well as access to deals for the dot-com boom. Tom also wrote the top-selling book, Investing in IPOs. In it, he covers all the aspects of analyzing an IPO, such as reading the prospectus, detecting the risk factors and understanding some of the arcane regulations. But don’t worry — if that process is too intimidating for you, thankfully Tom will do the legwork for you right here in the IPO Playbook blog.






