(p. 152) Google had considerable experience with pleasing users, but in the case of the auction, it could not create a simple interface. SEC rules demanded complexity. So the Google auction was a lot more complicated than buying Pokémon cards on eBay. People had to qualify financially as bidders. Bids had to be placed by a brokerage. If you made an error in reg-(p. 153)istering, you could not correct it but had to reregister. All those problems led to a few postponements of the start of the bidding period.
But the deeper problem was the uncertainty of Google’s prospects. As the press accounts accumulated–with reporters informed by Wall Streeters eager to sabotage the process– the perception grew that Google was a company with an unfamiliar business model run by weird people. A typical Wall Street insider analysis was reflected by Forbes.com columnist Scott Reeves, who concluded that Google’s target price, at the time pegged to the range between $ 108 and $ 135 a share, was excessive. “Only those who were dropped on their head at birth [will] plunk down that kind of cash for an IPO,” Reeves wrote.
Source:
Levy, Steven. In the Plex: How Google Thinks, Works, and Shapes Our Lives. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2011.