经济学人下载:推特上市 先闻其声?

Business
商业报道

Twitter's IPO
推特上市

Going cheep?
先闻其声？

The microblogging firm's shares may not be the bargain investors are hoping for
推特股价可能高于投资者预期

TWITTER is already a social-media star.
推特已经是社交明星。

Now it hopes to become the toast of the stockmarket too.
现在它又希望可以成为股票市场的新星。

The firm has gradually been unveiling more information about its business.
为了准备在纽约证券交易所的上市交易，

But as it gets ready for its first day of trading as a public company on the New York Stock Exchange, which looks likely to be on November 7th, opinions about a fair price for the shares vary considerably.
这家公司现在开始逐渐公开一部分商业信息。上市日期大概在11月7日左右，现在对其股票上市的价格有诸多意见。

The firm has announced a provisional range of between 17 and 20 for its stock, which would value it at up to 11.1 billion.
推特表示其股票价格暂定在17到20美金之间，总价值可达111亿美元。

Speculation is rife that Twitter and its bankers could set an even loftier price before trading starts, though as we went to press no change had been announced.
虽然现在还没有消息称公司会改变发售价但普遍认为推特及其银行会在股票发售前定一个较高的价格。

If they do push the price higher, long-term investors could get their fingers burned.
如果他们真的抬高了发售价，那些长线投资者的利益将会有所损失。

Twitbulls point out that Twitter is going public at a time when social-media stocks are all the rage.
推文指出现在社交媒体类股票风靡一时，于是推特选在这时上市。

On October 30th Facebook's share price, which had already risen by 84% this year, soared in after-hours trading following news that its latest quarterly revenue had hit 2 billion.
10月30号，脸书公布其最新季度收入达到20亿美金，之后其股票飙升，而今年它的股票已经升了84%了。

LinkedIn has seen its stellar revenue growth slow a bit recently, but its shares are still up 95% this year.
LinkedIn 最近的主要收入增长有所放缓，但今年他的股票仍涨了95%。

Twitter's boosters also claim that the company deliberately set a conservative initial price range to fuel investor interest in its stock, noting that an internal valuation conducted by the firm in August reckoned its shares were worth 20.62 each at the time.
推特的支持者声称公司故意设置了一个保守的价格区间以吸引投资者，公司在8月份内部股价认为当时价值20.62美元每股。

The company has continued to increase its audience, and now boasts 232m users that visit it at least once a month.
现在公司的关注度在持续上升，至少有2亿3千2百万用户每月至少浏览一次。

Small wonder, then, that some financial folk are predicting Twitter's stock will fly even if the IPO price is a bit higher than the existing range.
不足为奇的是，一些民间金融预测推特的股票会上涨即使IPO的价格略高于现有区间。

Brian Wieser of Pivotal Research Group reckons its shares will be changing hands at 29 by the end of the year.
广告业研究机构匹维托研究集团的布莱恩?维瑟认为这支股票到年末会涨至29美元。

Others are even more optimistic.
甚至还有一席人表现得更为乐观。

Doug Kass of Seabreeze Partners Management, a hedge fund, has said he thinks the share price of Twitter could double within its first month of trading and that he would be willing to pay up to 32.50 for its shares. Twitbulls like to point out that Twitter is currently generating about 2.30 of revenue per user.
海风资产管理公司的对冲基金管理人Doug Kass表示他认为股票价格会在交易的第一个月翻倍，他愿意以32.5美元的价格买入股票。

That is much less than Facebook makes from its audience, implying Twitter has plenty of room to boost sales.
推文指出推特最近可以在每个用户上收入约2.30美元，远脸书的收益，旨在暗示推特任由上涨空间。

But they gloss over an important fact. Unlike Facebook and LinkedIn, which were making healthy profits before they went public, Twitter is still losing money—134m in the first nine months of this year compared with 71m in the same period of 2012.
但是他们掩盖了一个重要事实。推特不像脸书和LinkedIn那样在上市前健康盈利，而是还在亏损。

These losses make it impossible to compare Twitter's IPO with others using the traditional yardstick of a price-earnings ratio.
今年的前9个月亏了1.34亿美金，去年同期则亏损了7千1百万美金。这些亏损使得推特的IPO不能用传统的价格收益比来衡量。

Instead, analysts often look at another measure: the ratio of a firm's proposed market capitalisation at IPO to the past 12 months' sales.
相反，分析家经常看其他数据，例如公司就过去12个月销售及IPO所提出的公司目标市值比。

Jay Ritter, a professor at the University of Florida, has calculated this ratio for Twitter using a share price of 18.50, which is the midpoint of its proposed range.
Jay Ritter佛罗里达大学教授根据这个比计算得出推特的股价应在18.50美元，这一价格处于公司提出的股价范围的中位。

Counting in restricted shares and those associated with outstanding stock options, this produces a market cap of 12.9 billion and a price-to-sales ratio of 24.1 based on Twitter's revenues over the past 12 months.
计算有限的股票和相关的优秀股权，这产生了大约129亿元的市场价值和24.1的市销率。

That is the third-highest PSR of any IPO in America since 1980 involving firms with significant revenues.
这是自1980年以来美国企业重要收入IPO中第三高的市销率。

Shares in the two companies ahead of Twitter in the chart—Facebook and Palm, a now-defunct maker of hand-held devices—fell sharply in the months following their IPOs; and Mr Ritter notes that the top 15 companies in his PSR ranking saw their share prices drop by an average of 5% in the six months after their first day of trading.
表上领先推特的2家公司—脸书和Plam的股票继IPO之后在本月快速下降；Ritter先生表示15家市销率榜上的顶尖企业的股票在第一日交易后的6个月中都平均下降了5%。

“A valuation at a high price-to-sales ratio removes a lot of the upside potential for investors in the public market,” he says.
在公共市场中，基于高市销比的估价减少了投资者的上涨潜力。

The challenge faced by companies with high ratios is to generate revenue fast enough to meet investors' expectations.
那些有着高市销比的公司面临着加快产生收益已满足投资者期许的挑战。

So far, Twitter has only a microscopic share of the 118 billion a year global market for online advertising.
到目前为止推特只拥有1180亿美元每年的网络广告全球市场的微型股。

Yet the fact that many people tweet on their smartphones means it is well-positioned to take advantage of growth in mobile advertising.
然而，很多人用智能机发推特表示了它能很好地利用手机广告的增长。

On the other hand the compact nature of its tweets, limited to 140 characters, means that Twitter will find it harder than Facebook to generate ad formats that mint money.
另一方面，由于140字符的限制使得推特短小精悍，这意味着较脸书推特跟难产生广告效应从而盈利。

And it now faces much stiffer competition from the social network and other companies such as Google in the mobile-ad arena.
同时现在它正面临着来自其他社交媒体和类似谷歌的公司在手机广告领域的挑战。

Trick or tweet?
恶作剧还是推特

So what is a fair value for Twitter's shares?
所以推特的真正股票价值是多少？

Aswath Damodaran, a professor at New York University, has built a valuation model that assumes Twitter will scoop up around 5.5% of the online ad market by 2023, giving it revenues of 11.2 billion.
Aswath Damodaran纽约大学教授建立了价值模型，估计到2023年推特的网络广告市场将会增加5.5%，这会给企业带来112亿美元的收入。

His model also posits an operating margin of 25% for the company, which seems plausible given that of other internet firms that have grown fast.
他的模型还假定基于其他网络公司快速发展的情况下，推特营运利润率为25%看上去是可信的。

Based on his analysis, he reckons Twitter's shares are worth 17.84 each, which is towards the lower end of Twitter's current price range.
根据他的分析，他推算推特的股票脚趾17.84美元每股，低于推特最近给出的价格范围。

Given the many uncertainties that still dog the company's business model, a price of around 18 a share seems reasonable.
由于公司发展仍有很多不确定性，每股18美元左右的售价是比价合理的。

But investors who like volatility may still want to take a flutter on Twitter's stock even if the price is somewhat higher.
但是那些活跃的投资者仍想入手推特的股票，即使价格有些高。

Given all of the hype around the company, Twitter's shares could spike upwards immediately after its IPO, allowing investors to mint money by buying and selling quickly.
在大肆宣传之后，推特的股票会在其上市后发行，允许投资者以快速买卖的方式流动资金。

So Twitter's flotation could be a great short-term trading opportunity.
所以推特发行股票是一个很好的短期交易机会。

But at anything above 18 each, its shares will be a poor long-term investment.
但是任何一股超过18美元每股后，他就会变成长期投资。