Yelp Closes 5-Star IPO Day with $1.47 Billion Valuation

CommanderFrank

Cat Can't Scratch It
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Another week and another overpriced tech related IPO storms Wall Street. This week it was Yelp’s turn in the corporate barrel and came out 63% over the IPO price. Yelp is a restaurant review site, relying on local customers for reviews worldwide.

Yelp is a local reviews website covering the United States, Canada, the UK, Ireland, France, Germany, Austria and the Netherlands.
 
i think folks are just desperate for somewhere to put their money. real estate is junk unless youre a developer, forex is too volatile, there are lots of hurdles impeding the regular joe from investing in the brics... a potentially bright spot in an otherwise anemic market is probably the biggest draw.

this bodes well for facebook, i guess...
 
So we have a company which produces no physical goods, has an easily-copied business model, and relies on users to contribute content for free....

Wait, this isn't myspace?
 
Goes to show that nothing has changed regulation wise since the last two serious melt downs. It won't change because the ones who make money in this kind of environment are still in charge. So in the next melt down what are the taxpayers going to give up. Their pensions , social security, have been mortgaged to the hilt to benefit the money changers, whats left for the taxpayers to give up.
 
Goes to show that nothing has changed regulation wise since the last two serious melt downs. It won't change because the ones who make money in this kind of environment are still in charge. So in the next melt down what are the taxpayers going to give up. Their pensions , social security, have been mortgaged to the hilt to benefit the money changers, whats left for the taxpayers to give up.

We could always just let stupid ventures like this die on their own and not bail them out...
 
Has anyone here ever even been to the Yelp website?

I think I've only heard the name once or twice before ever.

How can something that unknown have a market cap of over 1B?
 
Has anyone here ever even been to the Yelp website?

I think I've only heard the name once or twice before ever.

How can something that unknown have a market cap of over 1B?

Are you kidding me? Yelp is pretty damn huge, they are probably one of the largest restaurant and service business review sites there are. Most restaurants around Seattle have 50+ reviews on them giving some pretty detailed (and useful) feedback of whats around.
 
Yelp competes directly with Zagat (even though Yelp is more than food reviews). The thing with Yelp is that they play on popularity and social aspects then great practical reviews to enlist the Yelp Elite squad. As others have said it deals a lot with the smartphone as you can become royalty of places and earn badges. Business' pay Yelp to get special privileges, and usually write off Yelp Elite events to get more notice. Majority of Yelp Elites will give great reviews if given free stuff or if it is listed as an Yelp event. As with most review sites that do not have great ways filtering content of reviews you must read a few reviews at different stars if possible to really understand the business. I was an Elite last year before they dropped me (I rate honestly and do not drink?), they do not give reasons for taking away Elite status. Google places is trying to get into the pot and since Google bought Zagat. Yelp does make users use real names unverified though while Google does not, and Yelp perks are pretty good if you do make Elite (free food, drinks, activities, and Yelp trade show merchandise). All major review sites have issues of paid reviews by marketing companies. Yelp gears their mobile app for iPhone users and takes forever to get features onto Android and other smartphones. It will be interesting to see how well some of these companies make it in the stock market.
 
Has anyone here ever even been to the Yelp website?

I think I've only heard the name once or twice before ever.

How can something that unknown have a market cap of over 1B?

Yes, I haven't heard of it either really. I think I saw a Yelp! icon somewhere on a blogspot blog or something... like login withyour facebook, yahoo, etc etc etc yelp icon, etc etc. I guess I must not been a fine connoseuier of food :p.

Honestly, I like to try new places when I eat out by going downtown and going "What do I feel like...oh a Korean BBQ place. Sounds fun" and next week "What do I feel like... oh a place called Mad Mango Cafe?...Sounds interesting".
 
Overvalued, overbought, still not profitable... pass.
 
yelp is ok to visit occasionally if you want an opinion, or want to find out about parking.
But the opinions are all over the place, so it's still not a super useful website.

also, i heard yelp will take bribes to screen out bad reviews for your restaurant? how does that work....
 
Heres what I dont understand... The core valuation for most of these companies relies on online advertising. In all reality, who actually looks or pays any attention to online advertising (assuming the consumer does not already have them blocked completely)?
 
I think it's fantastic site. I use it all the time. It's definitely more used in urban areas. If you do live in an urban area lots of places have stickers on their door that say "People on Yelp Love us" usually in the same place as the Zagat signs. If you haven't seen the Zagat signs (been around for a very very long time) I don't know what to say to you :p

I do think this stock price is over valued, but definitely does have value to it.
 
i use it alot to search near by food places since houston is such a big city it is very helpfull.
 
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