The JS that drives that is awful. Why are they not using an array?
nytg.buttonText="What else is facebook worth more than?,What else is facebook worth more than?,What else is facebook worth more than?,Keep going?,One more time?,Another one?,Again?,It might be time to stop,I can generate thousands of these".split(",");
At the time of IPO, several sources said the $38 offering price gave FB a market cap of $104 billion. At $31 a share, that does indeed translate to $84.84 billion.
Google Finance lists 2.14 billion shares outstanding, which is where they get their market cap. Yahoo Finance lists 2.74 billion shares.
While I'm not going to say that facebook is worth 100 billion (or even the 66 billion it's at right now), it's easy to forget one fact: facebook is operating in almost every part of the globe. The companies that are referenced in the feature may be large and well established, but few if any have the global penetration of facebook.
Global penetration is only useful if you can make money from it though, and it brings the problems of operating in multiple countries with different currencies, cultures, legal systems etc.
Lots of the companies referenced in the feature have stayed in their home market for a good reason.
Ford Motor Company: $38.4 billion
Public Storage: $23.6 billion
Whole Foods: $15.4 billion
Sara Lee: $12.4 billion
Campbell Soup: $10.7 billion
JetBlue: $1.2 billion
EarthLink: $897.4 million combined
I think this does a better job of showing that stock prices are about future expectations rather than current assets than just about anything else I could find. Just have Ford Motor Co. on here typifies that.
The real question is whether it can possibly live up to that.
Facebook isn't tied to paying the pensions of hundreds of thousands of people due to poorly conceived agreements made in the 1970s which they will be nationalized if they attempt to get out of, which means they avoid the drag on their valuation suffered by the major American health insurance company on your list.
I'd venture that none of the brands mentioned in this comparison are used by as many people as Facebook. Everybody you know uses Facebook. How many people do you know that drive a Ford? 1 of 10?
Given the fact that stock valuations are highly volatile I think the current drop os FB as well as comparisons of market caps is kind of pointless.
Things have the value people are willing to pay for them, and no matter what stock experts say this has imho nothing to do with actual values or assets a company might have. It maybe enough for some analysts to not understand your business model and your stock value drops way down. On the other hand, if analysts like it stocks go up. And that doesn't tell anything about the actual quality of your business model.
Equaly pointless but at least more entertaining were the list of what Apple could buy with its 100 bn in cash.
Interessting point in case: The soaring stock price of the german TV set maker (Loewe I think it was) after someone claimed they where about to de bought by Apple. Did the value of their assets change over night? No.
Now, FBs stock drops because people say they don't see any actual value behind and the stock was actually overvalued right from the start. Maybe it was I don't know. But nobody complains when stock drop because some banks say they don't belief in future prospects. So it seems to me the same people choose their arguments only to fit the current situation.
Not all of them of course, the really good ones (W. Buffet among others) act diffrently.
27 comments
[ 181 ms ] story [ 1183 ms ] threadThe cost of the split is minimal, and it allows for easy addition, editing, or removal of strings.
Also, this snippet is hardly the JS that "drives" the thing.
At the time of IPO, several sources said the $38 offering price gave FB a market cap of $104 billion. At $31 a share, that does indeed translate to $84.84 billion.
Google Finance lists 2.14 billion shares outstanding, which is where they get their market cap. Yahoo Finance lists 2.74 billion shares.
Hmmmmm.
Lots of the companies referenced in the feature have stayed in their home market for a good reason.
The real question is whether it can possibly live up to that.
Users aren't everything.
Why not just stick all of the data in a single table or create a cool info graphic.
News sites also enjoy creating photo carousels. Why?
Things have the value people are willing to pay for them, and no matter what stock experts say this has imho nothing to do with actual values or assets a company might have. It maybe enough for some analysts to not understand your business model and your stock value drops way down. On the other hand, if analysts like it stocks go up. And that doesn't tell anything about the actual quality of your business model.
Equaly pointless but at least more entertaining were the list of what Apple could buy with its 100 bn in cash.
Interessting point in case: The soaring stock price of the german TV set maker (Loewe I think it was) after someone claimed they where about to de bought by Apple. Did the value of their assets change over night? No.
Now, FBs stock drops because people say they don't see any actual value behind and the stock was actually overvalued right from the start. Maybe it was I don't know. But nobody complains when stock drop because some banks say they don't belief in future prospects. So it seems to me the same people choose their arguments only to fit the current situation.
Not all of them of course, the really good ones (W. Buffet among others) act diffrently.