Chris Nerney

So there I was in upstate Maine, enjoying a week away from the madness of the Internet stock and IPO markets, when a bright object soared by in the coastal sky. It was MP3.com’s IPO, which opened Wednesday at $92 a share after 12.3 million shares of MPPP were offered at $28 each. But no […]

I’m going on vacation next week, but the market apparently isn’t. There are as many as 15 IPOs from Internet companies slated to go out in the five days starting on July 19. Add in leftovers such as Travelscape.com and Cyber Merchants Exchange, and come Monday we could see the busiest IPO launch pad of […]

The trouble with survival strategies is they’re usually short-term, designed to stave off imminent extinction while management frantically casts about for some kind of turnaround strategy or, failing that, a bolt of lightning. But when neither fails to occur, the company in question soon finds itself back on the ledge, peering down at a steep […]

The pace is slowing slightly for Internet IPOs this month, but the average first-day return could be higher than any since January, thanks to several big debuts and no real misfires (yet). TIBCO Software’s initial public offering on Wednesday is the 10th Internet IPO this month. Given that we’re almost half-way through July, it’s not […]

The only question about China.com remaining on Tuesday is whether the Asian portal’s stock price will go even higher before the trading bell rings. As expected, China.com’s IPO blasted off the Nasdaq launch pad Tuesday, opening at $45.75 – more than twice the $20 offer price set on Monday – and quickly rising to $66 […]

In recent weeks there have been a number of media stories about the poor performance of Internet stocks in the long run. Through May and most of June, many analysts and commentators, seizing upon the slump that gripped the Internet sector in mid-April, were quick to point out that most Internet stocks were trading below […]

The four-year, $89 million alliance with America Online that drkoop.com announced this week is a perfect example of the power of branding. Immediately after the deal was made public on Tuesday, drkoop.com shares surged in heavy trading, reaching as high as $45.75 before closing at $36.88, up 56% from Friday’s close. While the stock’s price […]

One day after the ticker debut of musicmaker.com — the online music seller that went public just two months after postponing its IPO — another Internet company has dusted off a scrapped public offering. Shares of Web services company Interliant (Nasdaq: INIT) — which initially filed registration papers on March 12, days after it was […]

Remember when Java was the hot topic in high technology? That was two years ago, when dozens of software vendors were jumping on the bandwagon being built by Java creator Sun Microsystems to derail Microsoft’s monopoly in computer operating systems. The Java movement attracted thousands of programmers and millions of dollars in venture capital, as […]

After sprinting into the mid-summer holiday weekend, the Internet IPO market should ease up this week, as only eight Net companies are tentatively scheduled to begin selling stock. And since there always are a few companies that don’t make it out (indeed, four of the eight on this week’s roster are holdovers), we could see […]

Here’s a question to submit to Web search service Ask Jeeves: What happened to the era of the wised-up Internet investor? As is the case with many queries posed to Ask Jeeves, don’t expect a satisfying answer. You sure won’t get one from me; I’m as puzzled as anyone as to why so many investors […]

So much has happened on the Internet stock and IPO scene in the first six months of 1999, it’s hard to imagine the breakneck pace keeping up in the latter half of the year. But for good or bad, it will. The Internet IPO dam has burst, and even the severe plunge in ‘Net stock […]