51.5 F
Laguna Hills
Thursday, Mar 28, 2024
-Advertisement-

Buy.Com Takes Steps Toward IPO

Buy.com Inc. may yet be a “buy”,or “sell”,on Wall Street.

The Aliso Viejo-based online retailer recently has made some moves that signal the company soon could go public again.

In late August and again in early September the company updated its January filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission outlining plans for the privately held company to sell $86 million of shares on Nasdaq.

“That shows they’re probably going forward with the IPO,” said Tom Taulli, a Newport Beach consultant who has advised online retailers and wrote a book on initial public offerings.

The absence of a fresh filing within a year of the initial regulatory work often signals an offering is dead, Taulli said.

Trading publicly wouldn’t be new for Buy.com, a seller of CDs, DVDs, electronics and computer gear that launched in 1997.

Buy.com had an ill-fated walk on Wall Street during the dot-com boom, eventually being taken private again by founder Scott Blum in 2001 at a small fraction of what it once traded.

The company’s latest filings, which include improved financial results for the first half of the year, were the first since a February amendment to the original filing.

Company spokeswoman Shaila Arora said, “We’re not releasing any further information regarding the timeline.”

Buy.com has tidied up an issue that might have concerned investors. The company owed some $26 million to Blum’s ThinkTank Holdings LLC, parent of Buy.com, and several other companies. The debt was set to be repaid with the stock sale’s proceeds, according to the January filing.

But the latest filings indicate Blum essentially forgave most of the debt. In June, Blum gave the company $20 million in cash.


For more on this story, see the Oct. 3 edition of the Business Journal.

Want more from the best local business newspaper in the country?

Sign-up for our FREE Daily eNews update to get the latest Orange County news delivered right to your inbox!

-Advertisement-

Featured Articles

-Advertisement-
-Advertisement-
-Advertisement-
-Advertisement-

Related Articles

-Advertisement-
-Advertisement-