After posting over 200 initial public offerings (IPOs) in 2007, the IPO market has been extremely slow during the first half of 2008.  As of June 20, 2008, there have only been 26 IPOs posted during the current calendar year.  According to IPOScoop.com, 16 of the 26 IPOs were priced upward over the year, while 10 have been priced downward. 

Despite the slowdown in 2008, Valuation Advisors, LLC, continues to capture information on these IPOs and includes the data in the Valuation Advisors’ Lack of Marketability Discount Study™ database (authored by Brian Pearson) located at BVMarketData.com.  IPO companies that were determined to have had transactions in their stock or options prior to the IPO are included in the Valuation Advisors’ database.  The pre-IPO transaction price per share is compared to the IPO price per share to derive an empirically-based lack of marketability discount.  After the recent update of new transactions at BVMarketData.com, the database now contains over 3,800 total transactions.

For more information on how to use the Valuation Advisor’s Lack of Marketability Discount Study™, BVR has posted to our Free Downloads page an excerpt of a Pearson telephone conference transcript (see Valuation Advisors’ DLOM Study).  To purchase the 2008 edition of BVR’s Guide to Discounts for Lack of Marketability, in which the excerpt originally appeared, click here.