Groupon Sliding
thenextweb.com
thenextweb.com
@thenextweb.com: please embed the real, functional widget; or, failing that, embed a chart that doesn't look like a widget. If you really, really must embed a functional-looking but non-functional picture of a widget, at least link it to the real widget.
And if for some reason none of the above is possible, and you really have to include a picture of something that looks like you can interact with it, don't make it clickable because doing so will confuse the hell out of people like me.
Yeah, it looks like they just took a screen shot of the Google Finance chart:
https://www.google.ca/finance?client=ob&q=NASDAQ:GRPN
Kind of weird.
I spent a few seconds trying to drag the dang scroll bar!
• they have to report their next-quarter results, the first reporting after they belatedly recharacterized a profit as a loss. They'll be watched like a hawk, and even if they report good results many will have doubts.
• the 6-month lockup on many insiders selling their shares expires
• Facebook goes public. Contrasted against Facebook and other newly-public real-profits, non-deceptive-accounting tech companies, GRPN will stick out as the shifty exception. It won't have the halo of being mentally grouped with other more solid companies much longer.
Groupon doesn't pay any form of dividend.
There is no major positive event to trade it around.
Given that, I'm curious to know what pension fund you think would invest in Groupon?
Agreed, they aren't restirited to buying stocks that fit that criteria, but that is how they invest.
> where did you get that information from?
Hedgie here. Almost all pension funds don't invest in stocks unless: a) they are part of an index and the fund just buys the index b) the stock pays out some sort of income that the fund can use to fund its liabilities to the pension holders. c) the fund has some advantage that the rest of the market doesn't have that can make it money off of hte stock.
I can't really see any of the above applying globally to pension funds that would cause them to be a net buyer of groupon.
Now those funds, typically hedgies, will get in and trade groupon, ie by and short the stock between chosen intervals.
you might not believe it from all the negative press groupon has gotten here but there has been some strong buying happening from the hedgies, accompanied by even stronger shorting.
The borrow has been the largest reason why shorting hasn't been stronger.
As to the original point of Groupon being "dumped on pension funds". You'd be surprised but the quality of many of the investment professionals working at pension funds, there are some really smart people working there.
They won't just buy groupon like complete idiots, they are typically very intelligent investors. The only case I can see them being net buyers are the points I originally listed.
1) they are forced to as they have to own certain indexes 2) the stock starts paying out a large and consistent revenue stream the fund can use to cover it's monthly liabilities. 3) they do a deal with groupon to put more money into it that gets them a value well below what the current mkt value is.
* next-quarter results are "less bad" than expected, and the large band of short sellers have to start buying to cover
* insiders feel that the stock is unfairly priced and are willing to hold on until it improves
* Facebook's IPO is a roaring success and generates a rising tide for all internet stocks
I think the first one has the most chance of happening. The stock is heavily shorted right now, any news that's not negative has the chance of sparking a rally.
- Present the coupon when settling the bill - Let your server know upfront that you will tip against the price before the coupon. And then do it.
But the real question is what the long term fall out from that will be?
From a former employee quoted on TC - "For all the shit he takes, you should especially worry if Andrew isn’t running Groupon."
I loved this.
Mason in the press gets an undercurrent of "not from the valley" or "former music major from northwestern" or "eccentric".
As a result the tilt of stories about Groupon suggest that it was built on "won the lottery" luck, not "when preparation meets opportunity" luck.
The guy built the fastest-to-a-billion in REVENUE ever online.
I get the inherent problems @ Groupon, but can't help remembering when Steve Jobs was dismissed as a has-been that was lucky to ride on the coattails of Woz, and thrown to the wolves by the board.
Together they would constitute the 'gambler's ruin' of online discussion forums.
I think the article overstates the impact of their stock performance on the overall tech market. If they underperform, it might keep sanity in the market. And most tech firms don't follow their business model. It may hurt coupon site fast followers, but that's not a big loss. The Facebook IPO will erase any bad memories of Groupon.
We had a great war of GroupOn like sites in past 6 months. But only one is working on it greatly.
It is a FAD for me.
http://www.valuewalk.com/2012/04/groupon-inc-grpn-accounting...
There is no accurate way to place a (positive) estimate/valuation of the operation or its profitability, personally I doubt they even have operating capital since it took that dive earlier this month. It looked to me like the tail end of a significant short selling position finally came to fruition by insiders who got in early.