
Groupon trading below $9 - nodemaker
https://www.google.com/finance?client=ob&q=NASDAQ:GRPN
======
capkutay
I wouldn't be too surprised to see Facebook stock head down the same path. If
Facebook was trading at the same P/E ratio as Google, the stock would be worth
$8 a share.

~~~
freehunter
At least it's an extra data point to show we're not in a startup bubble. If we
were, these stocks would be skyrocketing no matter how bad the company was
doing.

~~~
nirvana
In fact, how bad they are doing would be an asset-- "We're running as big a
loss as we can so we can grow as fast as we can!" -- I think Amazon is _still_
using that line. (though they are growing fast.)

~~~
wtvanhest
They also are not running a loss.

~~~
microtherion
True, they are not, but I recently came across this rather stunning plot:

[http://www.mondaynote.com/wp-
content/uploads/2012/05/Amazon-...](http://www.mondaynote.com/wp-
content/uploads/2012/05/Amazon-Revenue-and-Earnings.png)

Does this look like a hugely profitable company to you?

~~~
wtvanhest
I don't think a graph that shows what an income statement of a high growth
company always looks like should be considered "stunning".

[Apple will be an exception here, but they are a very rare case, almost every
other growth company looks like Amazon].

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thebdmethod
I know some people doing data entry jobs at groupon.

1- they hate their jobs. 2- many are hired as temp, and given absolutely
crappy wages 3- they are being hired to do something that could easily be
accomplished with some programming (i.e., taking data from one system and
copy/pasting it verbatim into another system)

~~~
jkuria
Andrew mason was quoted as saying:

"We view self-service with the same skepticism that a company in California
might view hiring a salesperson. And it's ended up working well for us."

So perhaps they also view automation (software replacing humans doing
repetitive tasks) with the same skepticism?

~~~
larrys
That's actually fascinating. And it makes sense from my perspective of a)
having been involved years ago in selling coupons to small businesses and b)
dealing with small businesses for other things.

You need to give them a turnkey experience, hold their hand and make it easy
for them. You show up with the "form" prefilled (I mean like a paper form) and
say "sign here and I'll do the rest." And if you drop the paperwork off (say
they are out to lunch) you put those little post-it arrows so they have
nothing to think about. This is really big with that market. I'm not a fan of
groupon but it impresses me that they are operating this way (and that Mason
said that).

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pwny
Maybe it's my limited understanding of finance, but I have trouble
understanding why people thought it was a good idea to invest in a coupon
company in the first place.

~~~
dkokelley
Honestly, it has little to do with finance, and much to do with hype. It's not
about fundamentals. It's about what the stock will be trading at in a month.
If there was a track record of dog crap selling for twice its value every
week, you would be stupid not to buy, right?! Sometimes there's just a bubble
of one.

~~~
aqme28
This kind of trading is called growth investing[1] and is very common and is
still popular within the financial world, despite the occasional setback.

[1]: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Growth_investing>

~~~
tomkarlo
There's growth investing, and there's pure speculation (which may or may not
involve growth companies.) He seems to be talking about the latter - buying in
the hope of a "greater fool". Growth investing is based upon the idea that the
purchased business will grow and the stock price will rise over time as a
result.

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pbreit
Many recent tech (and non-tech) IPOs are also down significantly (FB, YELP,
ZNGA, etc). So while Groupon does have some unique problems, it's also
tracking not far off its peer group. But I know HN loves to hate on Groupon.

~~~
corin_
While "HN loves to hate on Groupon" isn't wrong, it (probably intentionally)
implies that it's a HN-specific hive mind thing - whereas to me it seems the
hate it based on plenty of pretty logical and objective issues with Groupon's
business practices.

I'm sure not everyone has the same view, but my feeling is that a.) those who
don't hate on Groupon can at least appreciate why people do and not think it
idiotic and b.) it's not specifically about HN people

~~~
pbreit
I don't think it's very logical. I think most of the sentiment has to do with
raising lots of money, growing very rapidly, making lots of easy money, etc.
These are all things that many here are wary of.

~~~
corin_
In my experience, start-up success is one of the universally supported things
on HN, except in cases where it is viewed as undeserved.

~~~
pbreit
I don't think the crowd here is very supportive of big time success when it is
venture backed, involves large fund-raising and prioritized growth over
profits.

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Apocryphon
Is LinkedIn the only successful Web 2.0 IPO of the past couple of years?

~~~
pdubs
Amazon...and their P/E is around 175.

~~~
pbreit
Amazon is Web 0.1.

~~~
pdubs
Yeah that whole computing services/cloud thing is pretty behind the times...

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janlukacs
FB should buy GRPN to boost their stock.

~~~
astrodust
They could do it through a shell account, then have other shell accounts buy
GRPN stock to boost the value further, carve that equity up into AAA-graded
commoditized securities and sell them as bonds!

~~~
janlukacs
exactly!

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druiid
I have to be honest.. I follow and trade stocks and I hadn't heard that the
Groupon IPO actually occurred. The last I had heard they were having to re-
file and all that fun stuff because their financials were essentially one
great big lie.

Due to all of this, I am not at all surprised the stock is at the level it is.
IMHO the web-tech stocks released lately are all a big wash and pushing into
Web 1.0 'bubble' territory, dangerously

~~~
chestercheetaz
i'm having a hard time understanding how you follow the market and stocks, and
yet missed the Groupon IPO. Maybe you were on vacation??

~~~
pseudonym
To be fair, I don't think anyone missed the _initial_ IPO, given that roughly
half the stories on HN at the time were about how terrible an investment it
would be.

I imagine that if they had to pull and re-file their IPO (not being a follower
of stocks, I don't actually know that to be the case), their re-entry into the
market was most likely a little more...quiet, shame-faced and chastised, as it
were.

~~~
druiid
Likely I'm just remembering the chain of events incorrectly then! But either
way, yeah... that was a boat I saw along with the rest of the tech community
that was trying to bail water as quickly as it was coming in.

