6月20日在紐約證券交易所交易大廳，媒體、投資者和做市商齊聚一堂，急切等待Slack股票上市交易。隨著Slack標志性的信息提示聲“ping”響起，公司創始人及首席執行官斯圖爾特·巴特菲爾德該敲鐘了。Slack（代碼為“WORK”）開盤報38.5美元/股，超過發行價57%，盤中價格保持40美元以上，收盤價高過38美元。

但Slack沒有采用IPO（首次公開招股）方式上市，而是選擇了不太常見的直接上市。以下是從Slack上市中可以吸取的經驗。

成交量高

Slack開盤時的成交量驚人，令投資者和做市商都頗感意外。

做市商Citadel Securities負責此次Slack直接上市交易，執行服務主管喬·梅卡恩表示，原本預計Slack剛開始交易的成交量約將達到1000萬至1500萬股，在約2億股符合交易資格的股票中約占5%。梅卡恩表示，普通IPO的公司上市交易時成交量在流通股中所占比例為10%，而Slack開盤時的成交量達到了約4000萬股，比例遠超正常水平。梅卡恩評價道，“出乎意料地強勁”。

高額成交量和全天都很穩定的交易流表明，投資者強烈看漲。梅卡恩發表的報告稱，從開盤開始“買家就非常感興趣，盡管價位很高”，而且賣方出貨足夠?！拔艺J為，首個交易日大部分時間甚至全天強勢是個好跡象，充分證明了該股的實力?！泵房ǘ髡f道。

與典型的IPO交易相比，直接上市的供求關系略有不同，所以Citadel Securities等做市商之前有些擔心。事實上，“可能出現市場上存在買家，市場上是否有供應卻存疑的情況?！泵房ǘ髟谏现苋诩~約州蒙托克召開的《財富》頭腦風暴金融會議上說道。

但現在看來，Slack直接上市引起的憂慮已然平息?！翱赡茏盍钊梭@訝的就是開盤以來該股走勢十分穩定?！?德勤合伙人巴雷特·丹尼爾斯說道，他認為Slack “驚人穩健”的走勢是個好兆頭。

直接上市會變成趨勢嗎？

會有其他公司效仿Slack嗎？

“Slack今日表現優異，而如果還有其他一些公司密切關注（直接上市的方式），我不會感到意外。” 丹尼爾斯說道。梅卡恩表示，已經有些考慮直接上市的公司與Citadel Securities進行接觸。Slack的聯合創始人及首席技術官卡爾·亨德森在上周四向CNN商業頻道表示，之所以傾向這種非傳統上市方式，是因為“我們并沒有籌集資金的需求，這一點最為關鍵”。

但是，分析師認為直接上市取代傳統IPO的可能性不大?！拔覐膩聿幌嘈艜泻芏喙拘Х?，而且有能力這么做的公司很少?！?丹尼爾斯說道。“但如果有公司想知道這條路能否行得通，今天就能看到了。”

Slack的股價表現肯定會讓企業軟件公司格外受到鼓舞。

“這表明對企業軟件公司來說，現在IPO機會很大。”資產管理公司D.A. Davidson的高級副總裁兼高級研究分析師里?！べZ盧里亞說道?！邦A計年底以前會有更多的軟件公司IPO?！?/p>

Citadel Securities又怎么看呢？

梅卡恩報告稱，Citadel Securities本身便是“Slack的大用戶”，連為該公司上市規劃過程中也都靠Slack軟件溝通。（財富中文網）

譯者：艾倫

審校：夏林

Huddled on the NYSE trading floor, members of the press, investors and market makers alike hurried up and waited for Slack to begin trading on June 20. The company’s iconic message “ping” signaled it was time for Slack founder and CEO Stewart Butterfield to ring the bell. Opening at $38.50 per share, Slack stock (under the ticker “WORK”) traded up over 57% and remained in the $40s during intraday trading on its first day as a public company. The stock closed over $38.

But Slack didn’t IPO—the company opted for the less-common direct listing. Here’s what we learned from Slack’s trading debut.

High volume

Slack surprised investors and market makers alike by opening with formidable trading volume.

According to Joe Mecane, head of execution services at Citadel Securities (which managed Slack’s debut), his firm had expected some 10 to 15 million shares to begin trading—representing about 5% of Slack’s roughly 200 million shares eligible for trading. And while typical IPOs have 10% of their shares outstanding available as a benchmark to begin trading, according to Mecane, the roughly 40 million shares Slack opened with was far above that percentage. That, says Mecane, was “unexpectedly strong.”

The strong volume and steady trading flow throughout the day suggest investors were feeling bullish. Mecane reports that, “buyers were very strongly interested at a high price point” from the open, and there were ample sellers to match. “I think the fact that it’s trading fairly strongly … for most if not all of the day … is just a good sign for the strength of the debut,” Mecane said.

Unlike a typical IPO, the supply and demand dynamics for a direct listing is a bit different—a potential cause for concern to market makers like Citadel Securities. In fact, “you can end up in a situation where you have buyers showing up, but you’re not quite sure whether or not the supply is in the market,” Mecane said on last Wednesday at Fortune‘s Brainstorm Finance conference in Montauk, N.Y.

But it seems as though these direct listing-specific worries were laid to rest. “Maybe the most surprising thing has been how steady it’s been since it opened,” Deloitte & Touche Partner Barrett Daniels said. Daniels characterized the stock’s “amazingly flat” performance as a good sign for the company.

Seeing a trend?

Will other companies follow Slack’s lead?

“Today went very well for them and I wouldn’t be surprised if there are a couple of other companies that are watching this closely,” Daniels says. In fact, according to Mecane, there has already been a little bit of outreach to Citadel Securities from companies considering direct listings. Cal Henderson, Slack’s cofounder and CTO, told CNN Business on last Thursday that the non-traditional path to going public appealed because “we didn’t have a need to raise capital. That was the biggest driver.”

Analysts, however, aren’t convinced such direct listings will replace traditional IPOs. “I never think we’re going to see a ton of these, I still think that there is a very limited population of companies that can do this,” Daniels said. “But if they were looking for a sign that this works, then they got it today.”

Enterprise software companies, in particular, are sure to be encouraged by today’s results.

“It really just shows that the IPO window for enterprise software is very much open right now,” Rishi Jaluria, senior vice president and senior research analyst at D.A. Davidson, said. “I would expect many more of these software IPOs by year’s end.”

As for Citadel Securities?

Mecane reports that they are, “big Slack users as an organization,” and conducted planning sessions for the company’s listing over—you guessed it—Slack.