Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

Fender is planning to offer roughly $200 million in shares on the stock market. News at 11. Look for FNDR on the Nasdaq.

For further reading:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/ ... story.html

I had no idea 43% of Fender was owned under the not-so-guiding hands of a private equity firm, so going fully public can't be seen as a product benefit. Having worked for both a PEF and Goldman-Sachs, many parts suffer, but not profits.

Haven't been here for a while, but had to throw this out there.

Stan:Perhaps a 43 percent reissue model is on the horizon.

Scastles wrote:I had no idea 43% of Fender was owned under the not-so-guiding hands of a private equity firm . . ..

. . . generally believed to be managing the investments of Starbuck's Howard Schultz and friends. Also behind Restoration Hardware, Guitar Center (before Mitt Romeny's firm took over), and Jet Blue. It's formulaic.

It's good to see you hanging around the forum again Stan.

Unfortunately, Fender is not at all like the company it used to be back in the late 50's and early 60's.

Formuliac is right. Or maybe, formurelic in Fenders case.

No doubt the PE firm was looking at:

1. Bottom line

2. Whatever el toro poopoo the suits could create to expand #1.

Now, publicly held? I haven't heard yet how much of the company will secure this IPO. But, plan on things continuing in much the same "product" (as opposed to "musical instruments") vein, except more so. Things could get as wacky as they have been at Gibson lately!

jingle_jangle wrote:Things could get as wacky as they have been at Gibson lately!

Really?

Wildberry wrote:

jingle_jangle wrote:Things could get as wacky as they have been at Gibson lately!

Really?

Werner, just be glad you don't work in Nashville!

I guess that just as "Pre-CBS" became the nomenclature for perceived higher-quality Fender guitars back in the good old days, we can probably expect "Pre-IPO" to become the another category of distinction, since I suspect Jingle-Jangle's observations about corporate initiatives will likely be true and more-than-likely take the Fender company down another path, that is not likely to endear them to guitar afficianados.

Pre-CBS will continue to be the gold standard as far as many are concerned. All these more recent gyrations may be meaningless by comparison as a result.

Whatever the outcome is with FMIC going public the affects won't be limited to Fender. Gretsch and Guild will get the same treatment. Maybe better, maybe worse.

winston wrote:Pre-CBS will continue to be the gold standard as far as many are concerned. All these more recent gyrations may be meaningless by comparison as a result.

For "Pre-IPO" to become any sort of standard, the instruments made "Pre-IPO" need to have to be made of a considerably higher quality, which I doubt would be the case.