13 June 2018: Adyen nearly doubles on its Amsterdam debut
Dutch payments company Adyen began trading on Euronext Amsterdam on June 13, 2018, priced at 240 euros a share, and nearly doubled on its first day, valuing it at well over 10 billion euros. Unlike many fintech startups, Adyen was already profitable and processed payments for giants like Netflix and Uber. Its debut showed Europe could produce tech companies at Silicon Valley scale.
The lesson: Profitable growth deserves a premium, but even great companies can be bought at too high a price.
What it meant for investors
$1,000 in Adyen at the start of 2020 → $2,162 today, vs $2,092 in the S&P 500.
We start the clock at the start of 2020, the first year in our price data after the event. That is 2.2 times the money, and $69.85 more than a plain index fund made over the same years.
What Adyen teaches: An excellent business priced for perfection can still drop sharply on a modest disappointment, because high valuations leave no room for slower growth.
| Bought in | Price then | Worth today | S&P 500 would be |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | $740 | $2,162 | $2,092 |
green = beat the S&P 500 · red = lost money
What if you bought Adyen? Every starting year and the full story →
Could you have called it at the time? The wheel picks the year, you pick the position, ten seconds a pick.
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