Twitter Announces, Via Tweet, It's Filed For an IPO

How else would the social media giant announce an IPO?

Twitter is going public.  We know that because of a tweet.

About an hour after the closing bell on Wall Street, Twitter tweeted that it has filed confidential documents for an initial public offering of stock.

Twitter did not reveal any additional details, including any information on timing or proposed ticker symbol, other than to confirm the tweet is authentic.

The confidential filing was made under the JOBS act, which allows companies with less than $1 billion in revenue to privately work with regulators before making them public.

The confidentiality will likely help Twitter avoid the public hoopla that surrounded the initial public offerings of other high-profile social networking companies, including Facebook Inc., which went public in May 2012.

Twitter has been valued at around $10 billion.

San Francisco-based Twitter Inc. has been expected to file for months, so the news is not a surprise.

The company has been ramping up its advertising products and working to boost ad revenue in preparation for an IPO.

Goldman Sachs is the lead underwriter for the offering, according to CNBC.

One minute later.  They Tweeted a photo of people sitting around a conference table with the tweet, "Now back to work."

Shares of Facebook and LinkedIn ticked slightly higher in after-hours trading after Twitter disclosed it had filed.

Most of Twitter's revenue comes from advertising.

Research firm eMarketer estimates that Twitter will make $582.8 million in worldwide ad revenue this year, up from $288.3 million in 2012.

By comparison, Facebook had ad revenue of $1.6 billion in the April-June quarter of this year.

By 2015, Twitter's annual ad revenue is expected to hit $1.33 billion.
 

Copyright AP - Associated Press
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