Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) shares start their free-fall again After The Recent Recovery

The Facebook Inc(NASDAQ:FB) stock is down more than 50 percent again from its IPO price of $38 a share in May.

In September founder and chief executive Mark Zuckerberg managed to do some damage control and stemmed the one-slide down by assuring the Street that the company was devising strategies to monetise its vast mobile subscriber base and generate more revenues.

He also pledged that he would not sell any of his shares that would be released from lock-up later this year.

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The social networking stock flared up briefly for a couple of weeks, but things are now again back to what they were before his rare public appearance.

On Thursday the shares fell below $19, down more than 4.5 percent with more than half investors' wealth being wiped off.

Interestingly, part of the fall was due to the back-wash created by the more-than-10 percent fall in the shares of its rival Google when a draft copy of its earnings release was filed ahead of schedule.

Google's disappointing earnings sent its shares plunging and most tech stocks followed in its wake, including that of Facebook. It was also a day when Microsoft reported a 22 percent fall in its earnings for its first quarter and all-round sentiment was bearish.

The Internet search giant's lower-than-expected earnings have raised concerns over growth in online advertising and this has serious ramifications for Facebook which has been struggling with ad revenue growth.

Facebook is set to report its quarterly earnings on Tuesday next. The prospect for the company does not appear encouraging considering the results by Intel, IBM, Google and Microsoft all of which have been below expectations.

To top it off, on October 29, some more locked-up shares of Facebook will come up for release.

This is truly going to be a horrific Halloween for Facebook.