Initial Stock Offerings

General Motors Co. filed to become a publicly traded company again, the first step in its plan to sell stock that would pay back billions of dollars of taxpayer support that allowed the automaker to rebuild itself after years of devastating losses. In a regulatory filing Wednesday, GM highlighted its profitable resurgence from the depths of bankruptcy as it pitched what's expected to be one of the biggest stock offerings ever. Wall Street has anxiously awaited for the filing to learn how the giant deal will play out. The initial public offering comes at a time when GM's financial fortunes are on the rise.

Provena Foods Inc., a 15-year-old specialty food processor and distributor with headquarters in Santa Ana, said Monday that it intends to raise up to $9.6 million with an initial public offering of 1.2 million shares of common stock. The company estimated the offering price at $7 to $8 per share. Officials at Provena declined comment on the offering Monday, citing the Securities and Exchange Commission's "quiet period" rule barring most pre-offering publicity.

Google Inc.'s stock debut may have grabbed the headlines in 2004, but the revival of the market for initial public offerings was no one-hit wonder. In fact, the IPOs of 15 companies -- three of them based in Southern California -- have racked up even bigger post-offering gains than the 119% jump in the price of Google's shares since their debut in August.

Google Inc. became an Internet phenom by helping people find things. Shame it couldn't have found a better time for an initial public offering. Google shares could begin trading on Nasdaq as early as Wednesday. If they do, they'll be hitting the market in one of the roughest climates for IPOs since the dot-com crash. The Mountain View, Calif.-based search engine company said Monday that it had asked the Securities and Exchange Commission to give final approval to its IPO registration by 1 p.m.

Costa Mesa-based Tickets.com Inc. on Wednesday significantly raised the price range for its initial public offering amid growing optimism over the online ticket seller's stock market debut. Tickets.com, which provides tickets online for sports and entertainment events, increased the range for its offering of 6.7 million shares from $7 to $9 a share to $10 to $12 per share in hopes of raising as much as $80.4 million. Company officials said the offering may occur as early as today.

Nick Matzorkis already knows the Internet can be a risky business. His last encounter with the network ran amok when all but one of his Web page designers, who favored close-cropped hair and black Nike shoes, took their own lives as part of the ritual suicide of the Heaven's Gate cult two years ago.

The excessive yuppie spending of the 1980s is supposed to be over, supplanted by a 1990s financial conservatism. Not exactly the setting one might expect for a successful mail-order marketer of upscale children's items. But don't tell that to the marketer, a Westlake Village-based company called The Right Start Inc. The company not only is recording rapidly growing sales, it's also trying to get off on the right foot on Wall Street with an initial public stock offering.

J.M. Peters Co., a major Southern California residential builder, raised $10.5 million Friday in its initial public offering after sharply reducing the number of shares and their price in response to a deteriorating public market for housing stocks. The Newport Beach-based company sold all 1.75 million common shares offered--12.7% of its stock--at a price of $6 per share. The stock, traded in the over-the-counter market, closed Monday at $6.50 per share.

Key3Media Group Inc., the Los Angeles company that operates Comdex and other popular technology trade shows, plans to raise as much as $30 million in an unusual direct offering of its new stock when it spins off from parent company Ziff-Davis Inc., according to a filing made Friday with the Securities and Exchange Commission. About 92% of the new company's stock will be held by current Ziff-Davis shareholders, including Japanese Internet company Softbank.