Episode summary
3 Juggernaut IPOs: Did Investors Get Rich or Not?
Zacks Market Edge
· · 23 min · Hosts: Tracey Ryniec, Mark Zinski, Neena Mishra, Ethan Feller
Summary
The host compares four major IPOs to test the idea that buying a hot offering and holding it forever can create life-changing wealth. Using $10,000 as the starting point, she walks through Tesla, Facebook, Alibaba, and Alphabet, including stock splits, current share prices, and the resulting long-term values. Her core argument is that IPO outcomes vary wildly: some become massive compounders, while others merely look promising at the start and then disappoint for years.
Tesla is the standout winner. A $10,000 investment at the June 29th, 2010 IPO price of $17 would have grown to about $3.42 million by June 9th, 2026, even after surviving two stock splits and years of volatility. Facebook, now Meta, also worked well: $10,000 at the $38 IPO price in 2012 would be worth about $154,000, enough to help pay college, especially with dividends left out of the calculation.
Alibaba tells the cautionary side of the story. The $68 IPO in 2014 would have produced only $17,509 from a $10,000 investment, lagging the S&P 500. Alphabet, by contrast, was another major winner, with a $10,000 investment at the 2004 IPO price of $85 growing to about $1.68 million. The host’s conclusion is that IPO riches are possible, but only if investors pick the right company and stay invested through brutal downturns.
Key takeaways
- The host says Tesla turned a $10,000 IPO investment at $17 into about $3.42 million if held through two splits and years of volatility.
- The host says Facebook, now Meta, would have turned $10,000 at the $38 IPO price into about $154,000, enough to help cover college costs.
- The host says Alibaba’s 2014 IPO did not make investors rich, with $10,000 growing to only $17,509 and lagging the S&P 500.
- The host says Alphabet’s $85 IPO price in 2004 turned $10,000 into about $1.68 million, helped by stock splits and long holding periods.
- The host’s message is that big IPO gains usually require both the right name and the discipline to hold through major drawdowns.
Notable quotes
“Well, are they all that they seem to be? That's why I wanted to look at these other hot IPOs from earlier in this century to take a look”
“So, can you pay for college with $154,000? Sure, at some colleges you can, especially the in-state schools”
“Alibaba has also not split in that time, but today it is only worth $17,509 and it's been 12 years”
“You can get rich off some of these. These are just four of the IPOs since 2004 out of thousands, thousands of IPOs”
How the episode opens
Stocks, bonds, ETFs. Straight out of downtown Chicago. This is Zacks Market Edge.
Welcome to Zacks Market Edge, the podcast about investing in your life. I'm your host, Tracy Ryniec, and this week we're talking about IPOs, because the biggest one in history, SpaceX, is about to launch. And by the time you're listening to this, it might have already gone public.
But I wanted to take a look at some of the other big IPOs of the last 16 years, and then I'm going to throw in a bonus one that happened a little bit earlier to take a look at that one as well, because I know a lot of people think, "Can I get rich off of buying an IPO, like these hot ones? Should I just put a little bit of money in just so I can be a part of it, and maybe it'll turn into my golden ticket? Well, are they all that they seem to be?
That's why I wanted to look at these other hot IPOs from earlier in this century to take a look. Now, all IPOs are not the same. There uh have been uh hundreds of them over the last 16 years, as we know.
But there's a couple that really do stand out, and these are the ones that are popular with um investors. We've used their products. We've been waiting for these IPOs in some capacity, sometimes for several years.
So, these are the ones I wanted to focus on. It's not hard to know which ones I'm going to talk about. Um and we're going to lead it off with the oldest out of this group of three, which is Tesla, actually.
And so, the Tesla uh story is very interesting from when they went IPO.
From the episode’s captions: roughly the first two minutes, lightly cleaned. Keep watching on YouTube →
Topics
- ipo performance
- investor returns
- facebook ipo
- tesla ipo
- alibaba ipo
Companies and tickers mentioned
- META
- TSLA
- BABA
- Tesla
- Alibaba
Watch the episode
Watch “3 Juggernaut IPOs: Did Investors Get Rich or Not?” on YouTube
Summary, takeaways and quote selection by Octagon. Quotes are short excerpts; the full conversation is in the episode.
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