Slack Soars In First-Day Trading, Up Nearly 50 Percent

Shares of Slack were up by nearly 50 percent in first-day trading, after the company priced its shares above its projected range.

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On Wednesday, the workplace communications platform set a reference price for its shares at $26 on the New York Stock Exchange. Shares began trading this morning at $38.50 under the symbol “WORK.” Today, the stock closed at $38.62, or 48.54 percent higher than its reference price, after topping $40 a share during midday trading.

Based on its valuation after its last funding round, Slack and its growth has been compared to the likes of PagerDuty and Zoom, which also focuses on workplace productivity. While they all have different audiences and strategies, let’s run with this comparison. For context, Zoom traded up 77 percent, and Pinterest traded up 33 percent on their first days. Spotify, which went through a direct listing as well, jumped 27 percent on first day trades, but then closed 10 percent below its opening price.

That said, early trading sessions only tell so much. A pop is just that, a pop.

In the meantime, we thought this would be a good time to take a quick look at Slack’s funding history. The San Francisco-based company has raised a total of $1.4 billion since its inception in 2009, according to Crunchbase data. Recent backers included Dragoneer Investment Group and General Atlantic. Famed investors Accel and Andreessen Horowitz participated in its $5 million Series A back in 2010.

See the interactive chart below for a funding rewind of Slack’s private life.