It's not accurate to call Snap, Inc. (SNAP 5.51%) a busted IPO, but it may just be a matter of time. Shares of Snapchat's parent company hit its IPO price on back-to-back days, closing at $17 on Thursday, and hitting that mark again as an intraday low on Friday.
Snap bulls will argue that it's encouraging to see the stock bounce off of those lows, twice. It failed to trade below $17, so it has yet to technically be a broken IPO. However, the trend is not the friend of those who are long the photo- and video-clip-sharing specialist. Snap stock has fallen for three consecutive weeks, plunging 17.3% in that time.
"It may not be long before Snap, Inc. (SNAP 5.51%) officially becomes a broken IPO," I wrote last week. We're getting close, but we're still not there.
Image source: Snap, Inc.
Snap turtles all the way down
There's never a slow week for Snap news, and things kicked off on an encouraging note on Monday. CNBC reported that McDonald's (MCD 0.04%) was leaning on Snapchat as a way to recruit 250,000 new employees on behalf of its franchisees this summer. The move makes sense, as Snap's audience skews a lot younger than Facebook's (FB 0.82%), fertile ground for entry-level hires at McDonald's.
A source also told TechCrunch that Snap was developing a second generation of its Spectacles specs. The report speculated that augmented reality features would be incorporated in the sunglasses that double as a video-clip recording device.
Snap also unveiled Snap Publisher on Monday, Snapchat's ad-creation tool that will roll out next month in support of its new self-serve ad manager. Snap will also help pair up clients with third-party-ad tech providers.
The stock ticked slightly higher on Monday's wave of encouraging news, but the stock would go on to decline for the next three trading days. Momentum was already on the side of the pessimists, but it also didn't help that Facebook's Instagram -- the photo-sharing platform growing faster than Snapchat -- rolled out another Snapchat-like feature
Instagram debuted Archive, a feature that lets users save earlier posts in a private digital folder. It drew comparisons to Snapchat Memories. Facebook continues to be a thorn in Snap's side.
Snap has generally struggled since posting disappointing quarterly results. Analysts have chimed in on problematic usage and advertising trends. There are also concerns with the expiration of post-IPO lock-up restrictions, potentially inundating the market with insider selling. It remains to be seen if insiders will be more or less likely to sell if the stock buckles below $17, but it doesn't seem as if it will be long before Snap stock joins the ranks of broken IPOs.
