Thanks @cannibalpeas ! An explanation of what I did for everyone’s sake. Disclaimer: holy crap risky, be careful if you do this.
At the IPO, it is impossible to buy short shares since there is no inventory from which you can borrow (two day clearance and such [note: now one day]). One brokerage said “no shares” and the other two said “no way, too volatile due to IPO” (a policy I guess). But, what you could do is short sell options.
On IPO day, with the stock hovering around $55-70, I short-sold PUTs at various strike prices, from $25-50, for various strike dates expiring in 2 days and 9 days (Mar28 & Apr5). By short selling a PUT, you are guaranteeing that you will purchase actual shares of the company if the stock price is lower than the PUT’s strike price point at the strike price (eg, stock price $10, strike price $50, you buy for $50 - ergo, “risk”). Basically, I was betting that the stock would stay above $50 before the option expired.
On day two, the stock started to bounce around and fluctuate too much for my risk appetite, so I exited all of the positions, some at a loss, most at a profit. Had I held firm and let them all expire, I would have nearly quintupled my profit since the stock never went below $50 (Mar28) or $32 (Apr5), but I didn’t want to risk actually being forced to purchase a few thousand shares and be left holding the bag.
So yes, I did treat myself to a nice dinner out from my little bit of fun on the IPO.
