Media News - Monday, January 30, 2012

Facebook set to file for flotation

Facebook could fire the starting gun on the biggest-ever technology company flotation by filing papers for an initial public offering as early as next week. Morgan Stanley is close to being picked as the lead underwriter for the social networking firm's stock market listing, according to a Wall Street Journal report. The company is understood to be looking at a valuation of between USD 75bn and USD 100bn. Facebook is expected to offer a 10 percent stake, raising up to USD 10bn in an exercise which could also make millions in fees for banks and other advisers. The appointment of Morgan Stanley as lead book-runner would be a blow to Goldman Sachs, which was seen as the frontrunner after arranging a USD 1.5bn private offering of Facebook shares in January last year. The float would dwarf Google's 2004 listing, which is still the largest American internet stock market float. The search engine giant raised USD 1.9bn, based on a valuation for the entire company of USD 23bn. Expectations of an imminent filing with the US securities and exchange commission, the precursor to any public offering, have been high since Wednesday, when Facebook suspended trading of its shares on the private secondary market. (The Guardian)

• Home |
• Seminars  |
• Events |
• Media Landscape |
• Newsroom|
• Media News|
• Resources

Terms of service and Privacy policy.

Copyright © 1992- 2011 European Journalism Centre. All rights reserved.

Valid XHTML and CSS.

European Journalism Centre

Sonneville-lunet 10
6221KT Maastricht
The Netherlands

Tel. : +31 43 325 40 30
Fax : +32 2 400 42 20

E-mail: info[at]ejc.net