Live data from Hacker News

Square stock drops 10%, is now less than IPO price

google.com

81–90 of 118 posts

Re: Square stock drops 10%, is now less than IPO price

#81

All the food trucks, street and market vendors, estate and yard sales, handymen, etc I see accept credit cards using Square. If they figure out how to hang on to this market and grow as these little vendors grow then they're in good shape. Being down 10% when the Dow is down 400+ points for days on is not unusual. The big question is - who is Square competing with.

Exactly my thoughts. In fact I can't remember the last time I saw a restaurant, coffeeshop, or food truck NOT using Square. If Square went belly up those vendors may have to forfeit accepting credit cards. I've not seen a more affordable competitor.

I've even seen these things being sold at Walmart and other supermarkets. I go to craft shows and see normal people accepting credit cards to sell their knitting and their quilts. It's really opened a whole new market. I can't imagine them going under, what life would be like after that.

Re: Square stock drops 10%, is now less than IPO price

#82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with that though is that housing prices are tightly tied to surrounding economic factors. You could go to some crappy neighborhood in a depressed area of the USA and get a great house for "nothing" (relative to, say, CA). If housing prices go kaboom, it's likely because there aren't as many people moving there, and people aren't moving there because there aren't jobs that can support people. And be carefu…

> The problem with that though is that housing prices are tightly tied to surrounding economic factors I really question what those economic factors are though. For SF it's clearly the availability of high paying jobs. However in Portland, OR (where I live) there are little to no high paying tech jobs available, and yet the housing prices are sky rocketing to levels never seen before. Given my basic understanding of…

> The concept of savings or retirement for millennial might as well not even exist.

Probably not a popular view, but I think there's some truth to it. Check out the Harvard JCHS article [1], more households are paying 30, 40, and even 50% of their salaries for rent than ever before.

Major shifts like this can only be explained by culture, IMO. Maybe the US is undergoing a major shift toward wanting to live in city centers, even at the cost of saving for the future? Or people in certain metros just think they're that exceptional / special / etc. that they "deserve" to live in a certain place? Or everyone in a high-ambition career think they don't need to save because they'll "make it" (maybe true?) and will have fuck-you money in a few years?

It's a big change from the past, that's for sure.

[1] http://www.jchs.harvard.edu/research/publications/projecting...

Re: Square stock drops 10%, is now less than IPO price

#83
post #63

cool story brah, you won't be missed. should have negotiated options at your job.

We should just prevent accounts fresher than 24 hours from posting comments.

How do you make an account to post an unpopular opinion?

Re: Square stock drops 10%, is now less than IPO price

#84
post #63

cool story brah, you won't be missed. should have negotiated options at your job.

We should just prevent accounts fresher than 24 hours from posting comments.

The positive uses of new accounts (described by foldor and myth_buster) add more value than the negative ones destroy. Being open to trolls is annoying, but it's a price worth paying for having an open forum. It's particularly valuable when a knowledgeable person—often the creator of a project or the author of an article—is inspired to make an account and comment on the story they know about.

Re: Square stock drops 10%, is now less than IPO price

#85
post #84
post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We should just prevent accounts fresher than 24 hours from posting comments.

The positive uses of new accounts (described by foldor and myth_buster) add more value than the negative ones destroy. Being open to trolls is annoying, but it's a price worth paying for having an open forum. It's particularly valuable when a knowledgeable person—often the creator of a project or the author of an article—is inspired to make an account and comment on the story they know about.

I know you're right but I don't have to like it :)

Re: Square stock drops 10%, is now less than IPO price

#86

Well, the NASDAQ[0] and DJIA[1] are both off 3% for the day right now, along with every other index around the world. Or, to talk about price movements that are probably a bit more noteworthy, crude oil futures on NYMEX[2] are down ~7%. It's been kind of a (minor) bloodbath so far in the markets today. So, a 10% drop for a young, growth-oriented company is not terribly surprising on a day like today, I'd think. 0: ht…

Well, for some people, myself included, the not-going-so-well recent IPOs (Square, Box, etc.) would help deflate the pressure on housing prices in SF/BA. I feel for the workers at these company, but it's becoming impossible to raise a family here when the rent/mortgage is creeping up to more than half of most people's salary.

Conversely, if the overall market is doing poorly (which it is), you'll get hit in your 401k/pension fund/retirement account. To which degree falling housing prices and falling savings funds would cancel each other out, I do not know. If it were just Box and Square that were doing poorly, you would be fine - these recent IPOs have relatively low institutional holdings as a % of total. Twitter, Facebook, Yahoo on the other hand - upwards of 60% of the stock is owned by institutional investors, AKA your retirement fund and Vanguard ETFs.

Re: Square stock drops 10%, is now less than IPO price

#87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, for some people, myself included, the not-going-so-well recent IPOs (Square, Box, etc.) would help deflate the pressure on housing prices in SF/BA. I feel for the workers at these company, but it's becoming impossible to raise a family here when the rent/mortgage is creeping up to more than half of most people's salary.

Preach, sibling! My wife and I have put in more than 20 unsuccessful offers attempting to stay in our unfortunately popular neighborhood in the last two years. We have been chasing the affordability train for some years now, our increasing bids never getting ahead of the frenzy... (today, it seems we're at peak market and it'd be foolhardy to buy perhaps...) NB: we don't just 'move further out' not only because of 20…

in my opinion, you're not really competing with those people, the real money that moves those markets comes from overseas. the local tech people just rent from the real owners.

with a global equities slump more foreign money might pour into california real estate.

Re: Square stock drops 10%, is now less than IPO price

#88
post #84
post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We should just prevent accounts fresher than 24 hours from posting comments.

The positive uses of new accounts (described by foldor and myth_buster) add more value than the negative ones destroy. Being open to trolls is annoying, but it's a price worth paying for having an open forum. It's particularly valuable when a knowledgeable person—often the creator of a project or the author of an article—is inspired to make an account and comment on the story they know about.

For what it's worth, I agree with this. Was it Fark that used to limit posts by new accounts? Someone I knew got written about on Fark and wanted to respond but couldn't because he didn't previously have an account, and as a new account couldn't add comments.

Re: Square stock drops 10%, is now less than IPO price

#89
post #53
post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but as soon as you buy one you will want housing prices to go up, just like any investment.

Exactly, so many people seem to forget this simple fact

This doesn't seem like a "simple fact", rather insanity that has caused many of the economical problems we have seen recently.

I don't buy a house expecting to use it 10+ years and still make a buck selling it afterwards. The same way I don't buy a car and expect it to yield me money when it's a broken beater, in fact, the simple fact of buying it immediately devalues it (to others).

(I guess this is because (1) the market and tax situation in the US are broken and (2) it causes the land to be vastly more valuable than whatever is standing on top of it)

Post reply on HN