Yelp (NASDAQ:YELP) shares were off almost 6% ahead of its Wednesday evening earnings report, with investors getting spooked that it might dive like the rest of the social gang — namely, Facebook (NASDAQ:FB), Zynga (NASDAQ:ZNGA) and Groupon (NASDAQ:GRPN).
But all that running was for naught. Yelp had a good second quarter, guidance was encouraging, and YELP shares responded by jumping 15% in early after-hours trading.
Yelp saw a 67% increase in revenue to $32.7 million for Q2, and absorbed a loss of only 3 cents a share — in contrast, the Street was looking for $30.7 million and 6 cents a share, respectively. And for the full year, Yelp thinks revenue will range from $135 million to $136 million, compared to a consensus of $128 million to $132 million.
No doubt, Yelp has become a trusted brand for local commerce. The company also is getting lots of traction from its mobile business — another sharp contrast to other social operators. But it looks like local merchants see the value in mobile ads.
While Yelp is down significantly from its first-day IPO jump, YELP has managed to take back some ground — at around $21.80 as of time of writing, it’s well better than its March pricing of $16 per share, and up 40% from its early-June lows.
Tom Taulli runs the InvestorPlace blog IPOPlaybook, a site dedicated to the hottest news and rumors about initial public offerings. He also is the author of “All About Short Selling” and “All About Commodities.” Follow him on Twitter at @ttaulli. As of this writing, he did not own a position in any of the aforementioned securities.
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.
Comments are currently unavailable. Please check back soon.