The Internet search engine Google offered its stock to the public for the first time yesterday, selling at 85-dollars a share. Creighton University economist Dr. Ernie Goss says the six-year-old company is worth a reported 23-BILLION dollars, but he will -not- be plunking down 85-bucks for a piece of it. Dr. Goss says from a perspective of risk assessment and rates of return — Google is a high risk and a low rate of return, perhaps a return of only about one-percent over the next year, so it’s not likely a good investment. Goss says investors like to know there’s a brick-and-mortar building somewhere that sells a product, as opposed to Google — which is a clearing house for information on the World Wide Web. Goss says Google will certainly be able generate advertising revenue since people around the globe use the search engine, but the problem is, generating enough revenue initially to bring a profit that would justify the 85-dollars a share. For the stock investment dollar, Goss says there are plenty of alternate places to turn. Other companies that have gone public recently, like Nebraska-based Cabela’s outdoor stores, are offering a much more significant rate of return. Cabela’s, he says, is generating about five times the return of Google.
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