Maryland-based 2U rose 7.54% in its first day of public trading, closing at $13.98 a share. The company, which is trading under TWOU, priced its shares at $13 apiece, which was at the high end; it sold 8 million shares while stockholders offered another 1.2 million shares.
2U was one of six companies that opened trading for the first time on either the NASDAQ or New York Stock Exchange market. The strongest price increase was experienced by Energous (WATT), which opened at $6, and closed at $10.58. Energous is developing a wire-free charging technology for mobile devices.
Overall, NASDAQ had its worst week since October 2012, noted MarketWatch. It was down 2.8% for the week, even though it finished the day up .1%. The S&P 500 was similarly mixed: up .5% for the day and down .5% for the week.
