Billionaires Take To Twitter To Talk Up Facebook

By Ryan Mac



On the day when the world's biggest social media company was officially unveiled as a public entity, the world's billionaires took to another form of social media to discuss the implications.

A number of billionaires headed to their Twitter accounts to discuss Facebook's initial public offering in 140-character bursts of nostalgia, reason, and even mockery.

Billionaire and Pacific Investment Management cofounder Bill Gross was quoted by his company's Twitter feed, @PIMCO, with a surprisingly sarcastic take on the whole offering.

"Gross: Go #Facebook!," read a PIMCO tweet at about 11:07 AM in New York. "I don't know how to use it but I know a Bubble when I see one!!!"

While Gross' comments will undoubtedly stoke the coals of the current Web 2.0 bubble debate, another billionaire has used the Facebook IPO as a time of reflection. AOL founder Steve Case has been tracking the company closely in the days leading up to the offering on his account @SteveCase. Presenting a stark contrast to Gross, Case tweeted: "Celebrating Facebook IPO today while reflecting on AOL IPO 20 years ago. Valuation was $70 million. Most thought Internet was a fad. #wrong."

Before congratulating Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg⿿a future billionaire by Forbes' calculations⿿Case also quoted Winston Churchill and compared great companies to kites that "rise high against the wind, not with it."

Yesterday, business magnate and Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban called Facebook's IPO as the "most important IPO to EVER hit the StockMarkets " and took to his blog to convey his perspective. Cuban believed that the interest generated by the Menlo Park, Calif.-based company going public could attract the average retail investor back to public stocks.

" If lots of individual, retail investors do buy into Facebook and they make money at it, that could lead to individual retail investors coming back into the market," he wrote in a blog post yesterday. "Something that individuals smartly have avoided for the last several years."

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