Violin IPO hits bum note

Flash vendor's stock traded at 22 per cent lower than $9 IPO price

Violin Memory's entrance to the stock market had a shaky start on Friday, with each share trading around $2 less than the vendor had hoped.

Last month, the flash firm announced plans to raise $172.5m (£107m) after finally submitting its long-awaited initial public offering (IPO) plans.

On Friday, it said 18 million shares would be priced at $9 (£5.58) per share on the New York Stock Exchange, but they traded much lower than it had hoped.

Shares started trading below its expected figure and closed at $7.02 per share – down almost $2 or 22 per cent.

The firm's chief executive Don Basile told Business Insider that he was still pleased with what happened.

"We raised over $160m for the company – we're very pleased with that. What the market does on any given day is not really a concern of ours," he said.