Facebook Stock Plummets

Facebook's underwriters pulled off the training wheels today, and the infant stock fell—hard. After a lackluster first day on the market, Facebook shares fell some 12% in the first minute of trading this morning, Reuters reports, dropping below the $38 IPO price to $33.67, where it continues to hover around 11am ET. It wasn't a small move, either; more than 52 million shares changed hands.

Facebook closed Friday a hair above its initial $38 offering price, but only because underwriter Morgan Stanley stepped in to prop it up. Without that defense today, the stock fell hard. "It was just a poorly done deal," one trader said. "It just so happens to be the biggest deal ever for Nasdaq and they pooched it." Stocks in general started a bit higher today coming off the worst week of the year; at 10:52am ET, the Dow was up 106 points. (More facebook IPO stories.)