So basically I have been following SBB pre IPO. I was one of the first to post on HC asking opinions pre-float. Not many people responded as no one knew about this stock. I did not end up participating in the float because floats often drift a few cents below the offer price anyway.
The point I want to make however is that I asked opinions on SBB and the answers came something like
Liquidity risk
Entire company overseas
Currency risk
High concentration of ownership
You know normal things that investors should be concerned about. Never did anything about fraud or illegitimacy surface. Then during the whole time SBB was trading before the massive plunge. Nothing from anywhere suggested anything was fraud. Motley Idiots also had nothing to say on SBB during this time. Now sure I understand that a big plummet causes people to be skeptical and seek answers as to why but it constantly rattles my brain about how people can doubt the legitimacy of this company.
Think of this, on the ASX you have some companies with a market cap of say 5 million dollars. These companies are mining/oil prospectors in Africa or Indonesia or Vietnam. None of these companies have to put up with people questioning their legitimacy. They may say management are incompetent but its a legitimate company. Now think about it, if you wanted to commit fraud it would be so much easier to start some exploration company and siphon money out of it and then say sorry we found no gold or oil. Instead we have a company building stores and selling clothes that has a market capitalization of about $40 to $50 million dollars.
Now I am not saying we should all be buying SBB blindly and support them no matter what. I am bullish SBB but want to maintain a balanced view. However come on an explorer with a market cap of 5 million can do business in Africa and not have the same legitimacy problems that we a nationwide retailer with a market cap of 40 million have?
SBB Price at posting:
9.4¢ Sentiment: Buy Disclosure: Held