We've noted that the initial public offering market has been much stronger than people anticipated. Most people assumed, wrongly, that Sarbanes-Oxley would continue to depress offerings. One especially bright spot recently was the uptick in venture-backed offerings. But that has fallen off a bit. June was a slow month, somewhat surprisingly given the previously torrid pace. The reason seems to be the giant Blackstone offering. It may be that a lot of institutional buyers wanted to pause and see how the market digested that issue. Not very well, it is turning out. There could be some frothiness to work through. In the last week of June, there was a spate of withdrawn offerings--the highest number since 2004--that claimed the likes of Everquest Financial. I'd like to see a comparison with private equity backed IPOs, which seem to be faring not quite as well.

For more:
- here's an article from Financial News