Restoration Hardware: Take Two
Friday, November 2, 2012 at 10:58AM Shares of Restoration Hardware (RH) are trading sharply higher today after the company's successful IPO. For investors considering whether or not to join in on the frenzy for the stock, keep in mind that Restoration Hardware (RH) was a public company once before and the results, to put it nicely, were not so great.
The chart below shows the performance of Restoration Hardware when it traded before being taken private in 2008. As shown, after trading above $35 per share in 1998, the stock quickly declined below $10 per share and never really recovered. In an interview on CNBC this morning, the company's CEO blamed the poor stock performance from its first iteration as a public company on the bursting of the housing bubble. However, the housing bubble burst in 2005, and RSTO was under $10 per share before even 2000! We know the stock market is forward looking, but five years?
Become a Bespoke subscriber today to access Bespoke's Model Stock Portfolio -- beating the S&P 500 by 27 percentage points since inception in May 2007.
