Facebook stock drops below IPO price as NASDAQ glitches hurt retail demand

Facebook’s massive initial public offering, the largest of any tech company to date, has caused no shortage of problems for both it and the NASDAQ stock exchange. After opening on Friday at $38, Facebook’s stock is now down to $33.73. While there are several potential reasons for the drop, delays and glitches have made the trading process murky and difficult. NASDAQ CEO Robert Greifeld has admitted that Facebook’s first day of trading “was not our finest hour,” saying he was embarrassed by the substantial technical issues the IPO uncovered. This morning, NASDAQ went a step further and told reporters that it would be making changes to prevent the problems from happening again.

The new IPO procedures, which were not detailed, would fix glitches that stopped investors from being able to see the status of their orders. NASDAQ will also be going through a backlog of orders that were not processed correctly, something that could give investors some extra money and could help give the stock a boost. Although Greifeld previously deemed the first day of trading “successful,” Facebook’s popularity provided a stress test from which the stock exchange (and underwriter Morgan Stanley, which is still reconciling orders affected by the glitch) is struggling to recover. Facebook is one of the most well-known companies to go public in recent years, but the problems at NASDAQ hurt demand from casual investors, as trades booked on Friday have still not cleared. Maybe Facebook should have hacked more than just the opening bell.