comScore Prices IPO
comScore is the latest hot deal for the fast money crowd to flip around. Will it fare better than theBlackstone deal? It appears so.
The company’s IPO priced today at $16.50. The deal went off above the anticipated $14-$16 range, an impressive feat in this tape, via a syndicate lead lead by Credit Suisse. The stock will trade under the ticker symbol SCOR.
Their business differs markedly from the models offered by recent takeouts aQuantive Inc. (AQNT-NASDAQ) and 24/7 Real Media (TFSM-NASDAQ), but everything in the digital media area is smoking hot right now, and likely an opportune time for VC’s to hit the bid given the level of interest in the space.
We provide a leading digital marketing intelligence platform that helps our customers make better-informed business decisions and implement more effective digital business strategies. Our products and solutions offer our customers deep insights into consumer behavior, including objective, detailed information regarding usage of their online properties and those of their competitors, coupled with information on consumer demographic characteristics, attitudes, lifestyles and offline behavior.
Our digital marketing intelligence platform is comprised of proprietary databases and a computational infrastructure that measures, analyzes and reports on digital activity. The foundation of our platform is data collected from our comScore panel of more than two million Internet users worldwide who have granted us explicit permission to confidentially measure their Internet usage patterns, online and certain offline buying behavior and other activities. By applying advanced statistical methodologies to our panel data, we project consumers’ online behavior for the total online population and a wide variety of user categories.
Indeed, the deal will offer another payday for several venture capital firms, including Accel Partners, Flatiron Partners and Lehman Brothers Venture Fund, among others.
Still, the world of web analytics is far from controversy free. Earlier this year comScore adjusted its methodology after publishers complained about its accuracy. Currently comscore mines data from more than 2 million global internet users.
Online display advertising grew 16.7% in the first quarter, while over ad spending fell nearly 1%. Overall internet ad spending, which includes search, grew 26% in the first quarter to $4.9 billion.
Big bucks are moving online, and accurate analytics are crucial to the maturation of the industry. The growth stock boys should be all over this.
March 14, 2007
Web-measurement firm comScore adds new metrics
MarketWatch
comScore S-1
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The content contained represent the opinions of 1440 Wall Street. This commentary in no way constitutes a solicitation of business or investment advice. It is intended solely for the entertainment of the reader, and the author. No position in securities mentioned
Blackstone Cracks Deal Print
Yikes
The stock price of Bear Stearns is understandably under pressure. Although they have been able to push out some of their near-term pain, their franchise’s reputation will suffer from the decisions they have made over the last week. Take a page from Goldman, guys.
How hard will it be for Bear find counterparties or raise money in their alternatives platform? Plenty, I would imagine. Non-existent risk controls combined with bad attitude is not exactly a prescription for long-term success. Good luck with that, Bear.
But the market has bigger problems than a bunch of dinosaurs who are making questionable decisions at the end of long careers.
Blackstone (BX-NYSE) cracked the offering price.
There are many golden rules in the big money crowd. But selling a stock that cannot hold an important print is a no-brainer.
Maybe the stock is merely flushing out the weak hands who jumped in on Friday. But the cartel needs to band together and keep that puppy above $31.
It might only be another chink in the stock market’s armor. But the chinks are starting to add up, and the bulls are struggling to keep their head above water.
I would expect more in the way of fireworks fireworks going into the fourth of July. I hope Mr. Market does not consider napalm part of the celebration.
The quarter end markup might have to be postponed.
Until September.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The content contained represents the opinions of 1440 Wall Street. This commentary in no way constitutes a solicitation of business or investment advice. It is intended solely for the entertainment of the reader, and the author. No position in securities mentioned
Just Another Pig?
The retail industry is as flaky as the teenagers that work the registers. And footwear can be the trickiest consumer sub-sector to invest in. For every CROCS, Inc. you have a Florsheim.
Heelys (HLYS-NASDAQ) recent IPO owed a huge debt to the runaway success of CROCS, Inc. They might have been able to get the deal done without CROCS setting the table, but without an assist Heelys valuation would have suffered.
Heelys’ stock has hit the skids however; it continues to plumb new 52-week lows despite blowing out earnings last time they reported. Overhang, in the form of a share offering, is the culprit. The Bear just downsized the pending Heelys deal from 8 million shares to 4.5 million. Maybe that will do the trick. Bear Stearns has another loser on its hands, although pricing the stock in the hole might finally do the trick and put it to bed.
And Bear reaps another payday.
But Heelys still suffers from a Jim Cramer induced hangover. Hype kills.
Shades of Fortress, and now Blackstone. Too much hype.
Both stock’s peaked when they opened for trading. But what would Schwarzman look like all dolled up? If the stock cracks the $31 offering price we might just find out if BX is a pig.
Hopefully Schwarzman’s friends are more loyal than Jimmy Cayne’s. The $31 level is a line in the sand that this suddenly jittery tape does not need to test.
Heelys Prospectus
SEC info
11/24/07
Friday’s Breakfast Menu: Pork Sausage
12/8/07
Oink
1/17/07
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The content contained in this blog represents the opinions of 1440 Wall Street. This commentary in no way constitutes a solicitation of business or investment advice. It is intended solely for the entertainment of the reader, and the author. No position in securities mentioned
Connecting the Dots that Connect Board Members
Although the recent news flow has been fast and furious, the announcement yesterday that the Board of Dow Jones will assume negotiations that will likely result in the the sale of the company to News Corp is notable. With the Bancroft family free to spend their summer sailing of Newport, the board can now roll up their sleeves and perform their fiduciary responsibility.
The process could be expedited by the fact that these folks that serve on these respective boards are on a first name basis with each other. In fact several members from each board serve in a similar manner on the boards of American Express, Ford Motor and HP, among others.
A legible version of the chart can be called up below, where you can see that Dow Jones board members Harvey Golub, Frank Newman and Vernon Jordan are well acquainted with Peter Chernin and Hamish Maxwell of News Corporation.
Does this guarantee a deal? No, in a word. GE and Pearson also share connections to Dow Jones through common relationships on hospital and museum boards, in addition to the requisite corporate boards. And for now that deal looks dead and buried.
There might be Six Degrees of Separation on Main Street, but in the world of clubby boards, the distance can be much less.
Like the width of a table.
Links below are best viewed in internet explorer not firefox!
Boards of News Corp and Dow Jones are Deeply Routed
NewsVisual
GE and Pearson Deeply Tied to Dow Jones
NewsVisual
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The content contained represents the opinions of 1440 Wall Street. This commentary in no way constitutes a solicitation of business or investment advice. It is intended solely for the entertainment of the reader, and the author. No position in securities mentioned
