Last week’s mega IPO from Twitter (TWTR) captured most of the market’s attention. If you looked at financial headlines on Thursday, the Twitter IPO seemed to be the only news. But there some significant stock movements getting overshadowed by the IPO.
Oh, and according to Jeff Reeves, there were also some major economic developments, such as with China and the dollar. But even that seemed to have little effect. Says Jeff: “[W]hen you have an IPO like Twitter that gaps up 73% above its offer price on the first day of trading, it sucks even more oxygen out of the room.”
Despite all that activity, investors still found time to buy up other interesting stocks:
Mindspeed Technologies (MSPD)
5-Day Return: 65%
There’s nothing like a buyout offer to juice up share prices. That’s what happened to MSPD last week, as the company agreed to a $272 million deal from M/A-Com Technology Solutions (MTSI).
MSPD is a developer of semiconductors for fixed and mobile broadband access systems. Unfortunately, the company has been a laggard for most of the past ten years. So, selling out seems like a pretty good deal for shareholders.
Oxygen Biotherapeutics (OXBT)
5-Day Return: 36%
Oxygen Biotherapeutics develops biotech treatments, with a focus on using oxygen to heal tissues. One of its drugs is levosimendan, part of an acquisition of Phyxius, and it recently showed promising results from a test conducted by the Duke University School of Medicine.
But given the small size of the company — a market cap of only $35 million — it doesn’t take much to move the stock.
United Online (UNTD)
5-Day Return: 23%
United Online operates a variety of online businesses, like Classmates, StayFriends, MyPoints, Juno and NetZero.
The stock’s movement was triggered by a spin-off of its struggling flower delivery company, FTD. The spin-off was completed Nov. 1 and caused the stock to gap up 40%. A better-than-expected third-quarter earnings report didn’t hurt, either. Profits came to 12 cents per share, and revenues hit $174.7 million, beating the Street consensus of 9 cents per share and revenues of $172.86 million.
But for an online operator, United Online still is unimpressive compared to companies like Facebook (FB) and LinkedIn (LNKD). During the latest quarter, revenues declined by 2%.
Voxeljet (VJET)
5-Day Return: 46%
Voxeljet is a market newcomer and a pioneer of the 3D printing space. For the most part, VJET focuses on industrial customers like like Daimler (DDAIF), BMW (BAMXY), Ford (F) and 3M (MMM).
The recent stock movement doesn’t seem driven by any company-specific news. Rather, Wall Street went into a bull frenzy for 3D printing stocks because of a positive earnings report from Stratasys (SSYS).
VJET went public in late October at $13 and has since climbed almost 400%, currently trading at $51.15.
Tom Taulli runs the InvestorPlace blog IPO Playbook. He is also the author of High-Profit IPO Strategies, All About Commodities and All About Short Selling. Follow him on Twitter at @ttaulli. As of this writing, he did not hold a position in any of the aforementioned securities.
