Barron's invites all to witness Google's fall

Just after it predicted a 50 percent drop in Google's stock price on the cover of its print edition, financial magazine Barron's opened its new Web site to the public as a promotion for its "market-moving editorial features," according to its press release.

Dow Jones recently relaunched Barron's Online, formerly part of the Wall Street Journal's Web site, as a standalone site with content exclusive to the Web. But it also contains the content found in its venerable print publication, such as a report Saturday warning that Google's stock is about to take a nose dive. For a week starting Monday, that content is available for free. Normally it will cost you $79 a year unless you also get the print edition, in which case the price falls to $39 a year.

The report appeared to have an effect Monday, with Google's stock falling nearly $17 to close at $345.70, down 4.66 percent. Barron's analysis was based on expectations that the company would fall short of ambitious revenue targets for the year, which would also probably drag down Google's price/earnings ratio. A price of $188 could be in store for Google investors by the end of the year, it said in its report.

Barron's feels Google's stock is about to reach the same day of reckoning that hit dot-com companies like Amazon.com and Yahoo. But it still thinks the company's future is solid, citing data from eMarketer that it knows all too well during a week designed to attract visitors to its Web site.

Adverstising dollars spent in the old standbys of print, radio and television increased 4 percent last year. Internet advertising, Google's bread and butter and Barron's Online's new friend, increased 34 percent.