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Airbnb swings to a loss as costs climb ahead of IPO

Jay Ritter

“Airbnb Inc. swung to a loss for the first nine months of last year as costs rose sharply, according to people close to the company, raising questions about the valuation and timing of the home-sharing giant’s much-anticipated public-markets debut,” writes The Wall Street Journal. 

The loss isn’t too unusual, though, according to Cordell Eminent Scholar Chair Jay Ritter, as he’s found that fewer than one in four technology IPOs in the five years through 2019 were profitable. 

See what else Ritter had to say about Airbnb’s anticipated IPO