Facebook IPO 10 years later a new name, same CEO, and known issues

A decade ago, Facebook said in the public market that they were pouring money into the app smartphones, as mobile devices were critical to the company's growth, even though it "did not directly generate significant sales revenue" at the time.

It's in the prospectus for its Nasdaq debut, which took place ten years ago on Wednesday and resulted in the biggest IPO for an American tech company. Facebook's market cap of over $100 billion soon made it one of the most valuable technology companies in the world.

But within three months, the stock lost about half of its value as the market heeded Facebook's warnings. With consumers flocking to smartphones before there was a proven business model for small-screen advertising, investors are concerned that the company's hyper-growth days are in the rearview mirror.

We know how it goes.

Facebook now generates more than 25 times more revenue than it did in 2012. And by 2018, more than 90% of ad sales will come from mobile devices. At its peak market cap in 2021, Facebook is worth more than $1 trillion, thanks mainly to its flagship mobile app and Instagram and WhatsApp, which it acquired.

The company already has a new name, Meta. And of the top six executives since the IPO, only two remain co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg and chief operating officer, Cheryl Sandberg.

However, to investors, the dilemma seems to be the same as it used to be. The tech landscape is changing, and Zuckerberg is making another bet on the farm about where he's going. Facebook said it would spend about $10 billion next year developing technology to build Metaverse, a virtual world of work and games that users can access via headphones.

As of 2012, there is no central business model, and there is no certainty that Zuckerberg's vision will be implemented as he predicted.

"My concern about the metaverse is that investing is more like drilling an oil well - you can come in empty-handed, get rich," said Brian Yaktman, chief investment officer at YCG Investments, which has more than $1 in assets. dollars controlled. "I want to know how big it is and who the winner is.