While the 
gaming world was busy watching THQ implode last week, a funny thing happened in the background. Zynga began trading in positive territory.
Boosted by Facebook’s IPO filing, the social games maker finally escaped the mire of mediocrity it had been stuck in since its first day as a public company and began to grow. The question is: Is it a short-term surge or the start of a true growth curve?
After its first day 
on the NASDAQ, Zynga’s performance has been less-than-impressive, and Gamasutra editor-at-large Chris Morris takes a moment to figure out exactly what went awry.
Shares in Zynga’s Wall Street debut may have started strong today, but minutes after they began trading, the stock’s pricing chart looked like something that even the most extreme skier would have avoided.
By the time all was said and done, the company was down 5 percent, closing at $9.50 per share (and was down as much as 10 percent at one point during the day), bucking the trend of the year’s other hot internet stocks, like LinkedIn and Groupon — despite the fact that Zynga is profitable, while those companies are not. What went wrong?
Social game maker 
Zynga’s much anticipated debut on Wall St. didn’t go quite as well as planned Friday.
The company finished the trading day at 9.50, 5 percent below its offering price – as investors, fearful of a new tech bubble, steered clear and analysts ripped the company on growth concerns.
Zynga’s debut 
on Wall Street Friday is the largest from a U.S. company since Google went public in 2004 — and it has been one of the most widely anticipated stock offerings of the year.
But if early trading is any indication, anticipation doesn’t translate into interest.
As expected, social game maker Zynga will begin trading shares on Wall Street Friday, marking one of the video game industry’s biggest public offerings in years.
The company has priced shares at $10 each, the high end of its expected range and will offer 100 million shares to investors. That puts the company valuation at about $7 billion.
[Though Zynga’s upcoming $1 billion IPO is lower than expected based on previous reports and market cap valuations, Gamasutra’s Chris Morris explains why the company is playing it smart with its low share prices.]
Five months after announcing its intention to go public, Zynga is about to make the splash, but it’s doing so with a much smaller splash than most people expected back in July.
Back then, when the market was teasing investors with a head fake of stability, analysts, and the financial media (along with most of the gaming industry) expected the company to raise between $1.5 and $2 billion – with an accompanying market cap of $15 billion and $20 billion. But when shares begin trading Dec. 16, the company will only seek $1 billion – and have a maximum market cap of $7 billion.
FarmVille has a date with Wall Street on December 16. And we’re all invited.
Four months after signaling its intention to go public, Zynga has finally updated the paperwork to let investors know the date is imminent, with shares set to begin trading in two weeks. But despite speculation about Zynga instantly becoming the highest valued company in the gaming industry, that’s likely not going to be in the cards.
You don’t have 
to be a wizard of Wall Street to know the market sucks these days. While the Dow Jones Industrial average is slightly higher than it was at the start of the year, persistent fears of a double-dip recession – or worse – are preventing both individual and institutional investors from jumping into the market with any gusto.
That’s starting to affect the valuations of companies with looming public offerings, including a high profile one in the gaming world. And it should be a lesson to other game companies thinking about an IPO.
Reports this week that Zynga is holding off on its IPO are not “a sign of weakness or scandal,” according to Gamasutra editor-at-large Chris Morris, who says it’d be reckless to go forward in current market conditions.
When reports crossed the wire Monday that Zynga might push back the launch of its initial public offering, the conspiracy theorists started buzzing. Later word that the SEC might play a role in the delay whipped ’em into a frenzy.
In fact, none of this was a sign of weakness or scandal. It was actually a sign that the folks running the business side of the game maker could a) read tea leaves and b) realize that early, enthusiastic investors might become confused, angry ones if a few things up weren’t cleared up.
At long last, Zynga has 
confirmed its plans to go public.
The company on Friday filed an S-1 form with the Securities and Exchange Commission, announcing plans to raise $1 billion through publicly traded shares. That wasn’t the interesting part, though. The really fascinating stuff was in the details.
Chris Morris: Journalist 