Melville resident Martin Blumberg, 70, snagged 400 Facebook shares Friday at the initial public offering price of $38 each, putting him in a rarefied investment circle.

Few individual investors got any shares at that price.

Blumberg, co-owner of the Port Washington-based Auto Barn chain, bought 300 shares through Morgan Stanley, where he has traded for about 20 years, he said. He had put in orders for 1,000 shares but his broker called him Thursday night with news of his lower allotment.

He also bought 100 shares through the online brokerage E*Trade, where he opened an account last year and traded often. He placed an online order for 3,000 shares, making his wife nervous, he said. He checked the site Friday morning and found out he had gotten 100 shares.

When he had visions of thousands of Facebook shares in his head, he said, his wife told him, "It is going to go down and you are investing too much."

He had hoped the stock would rise $8, enabling him to sell his shares at a tidy profit. But the stock closed Friday at $38.23.

"All the hype turned out to be nothing," he said. Now Blumberg plans to hold the shares for a few weeks.

So did his wife say, "I told you so?"

"Yes," he said. "That is exactly what she said, and a few other things that I will not mention."

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