A total of five Internet companies went public yesterday. One, Edgar Online, gained only a sixteenth of a point. Two more, the Hispanic content provider StarMedia Network and the online broker DLJdirect, performed respectably but not spectacularly, rising more than 50%. And the last two, Juno Online, an ISP (Internet service provider), and ZipLink, which sells services to ISPs, actually lost 11% and 12% respectively. And let's not even mention the debut of barnesandnoble.com, which gained a mere 27% on Tuesday. MORE >>
Where Are the IPOs of Yesteryear?
From TIME Digital: New Internet stocks used to be a sure thing. What happened?
"The party's over," wrote one visitor to the bulletin
boards at Silicon Investor yesterday, and even
veteran financial and technology journalists were
showing signs of nostalgia for those heady times
that seem like only a few weeks ago which they
were. Up until yesterday, Internet companies that
went public could look forward to seeing their
share prices pop up like champagne corks, but
suddenly .com IPOs are acting like plain-old
rational stocks again.