Is it Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s founder and chief executive officer ? Someone else at the social-networking website ? Morgan Stanley (MS), the bank that led the deal ? Nasdaq, which botched the stock’s early trading ?
Bloomberg columnist Jonathan Weil says that if you lost money on Facebook shares, which have given up about half their value since the company’s IPO, the answer is: none of these.
Ever since Facebook debuted in May, only to begin plunging in value within a few days, Wel says he hoped somebody of note would speak out publicly to take personal responsibility for losing money on this stock, rather than pointing fingers at others. A few days ago, it happened.
Mark Cuban, owner of the Dallas Mavericks basketball team, wrote a post on his blog in response to a column in which Andrew Ross Sorkin of the New York Times pinned the blame on David Ebersman, Facebook’s chief financial officer. Cuban said:
'I bought and sold FB shares as a TRADE, not an investment. I lost money. When the stock didn’t bounce as I thought / hoped it would, I realized I was wrong and got out. It wasn’t the fault of the FB CFO that I lost money. It was my fault. I know that no one sells me shares of stock because they expect the price of the stock to go up. So someone saw me coming and they sold me the stock. That is the way the stock market works. When you sit at the trading terminal you look for the sucker. When you don’t see one, it’s you. In this case it was me'.
Hit the link below to access the complete Bloomberg article:
Facebook Investors Know Exactly Whom to Blame
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image: © deneyterrio
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