Facebook Shares Fall Off Plateau In Latest Auction

A three-month plateau in Facebook’s stock price has ended, as the latest auction on SharesPost closed at $33 per share, down almost six percent from the $35 close of the prior three transactions.

Assuming Facebook still has 2.5 billion shares outstanding, the company has an implied value of $82.5 billion, down from a previous high of $87.5 billion.

An email from SharesPost explains that 100,000 shares changed hands in the latest auction that closed on August 16th — here’s the gist of it:

SharesPost’s affiliated broker-dealer completed its auction of 100,000 shares of the Class B Common Stock of Facebook, Inc. on August 16th. A clearing price of $33.00 was established at the auction. Members submitting Qualifying Bids at or above the clearing price will be contacted shortly with instructions on next steps for completing this transaction.

The lower price may reflect market opinion about the competition from Google Plus, which launched its game stream a week ago — and revealed that developers only share five percent of revenues during a promotional period of yet-to-be announced duration. This compares with the 30 percent that Facebook asks for.

The launch of Google Plus at the beginning of July hadn’t impacted the price that Facebook shares were fetching in the private marketplace — this is the third auction since the search engine’s social network launch, and the first two had closed at the same price.

The results suggest that investors hadn’t viewed the search giant as significant competition without the game stream.

We’re wondering whether the drop in price marks the beginning of a trend, or is just a temporary cooling off or correction. Only the next transaction will tell which way things go.

Readers, what do you expect to see in Facebook stock trades in the months ahead?

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