Freerealtime.com, the small but pioneering provider of free, internet-based, real-time stock market quotes, is planning an imminent public listing as a bulletin board stock in order to respond to demand for its shares from its 100,000 strong subscriber base. Freerealtime.com, which is funded via advertising, and which still only has 12 employees, is planning a reverse takeover of an already listed company, the cheapest way to take itself public in a hurry. The move is to be combined with a $1m cash injection from an unnamed institutional investor, a spokesperson said. In a circular addressed to subscribers, CEO Brad Gunn said he was responding to the number of inquiries he had received about investing in the company. Subsequent to the bulletin board listing, the company hopes to raise a further $5m to $6m with a more conventional institutional placing to take it onto the Nasdaq SmallCap Market in six to eight months, if all goes well. The company has been providing its registered but non- paying subscribers with unlimited, real time market prices since early this year. Most sites on the internet delay prices by up to 20 minutes to differentiate free services from fee-paying alternatives. Freerealtime.com asserts that it’s among the fastest growing sites on the internet with a claimed two million hits per day. It intends to use the money raised to add features to its web site, thereby joining the stampede to become a financial portal site rather than just trying to survive as quote service. But Freerealtime.com is still tiny when compared to highly advanced and heavily financed rivals such as E*Trade Group Inc, and may well soon be gobbled up.
