Facebook Shares Down in Premarket as Lockup Ends

Shares of Facebook Inc (FB: 19.80, -1.40, -6.60%) fell on Thursday as a lockup period that prevented some insider sales came to an end. More than 270 million shares have been unlocked - more than one-half of the 421 million shares sold in the May initial public offering of the social networking company. Lockup periods, designed to prevent insiders from selling shortly after an IPO, typically last for 90 days. The stock sank 6.2% to $19.88 in early trading, more than double the decline indicated in premarket action. With the day's losses, Facebook is off nearly 48 cent from its IPO price of $38. "Pressure will be back on the shares now that liquidity is back in the market,'' said Frank Davis, director of sales and trading at LEK Securities in New York. ``If (the value of) your holdings has been cut in half, are you going to sit around and risk the rest of that?'' Continue reading this article

.