Andre Yoskowitz
1 Feb 2012 20:32
Facebook, the behemoth social network with over 850 million users around the globe has finally filed to go public.
The offering will be the largest ever, surpassing Google's in 2004. The company will go by the ticker "FB" later this year and the major banks Morgan Stanley, JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs are the underwriters.
In their S-1 document, the social network reveals it had revenue of $3.71 billion in 2011, up from $1.97 billion the year before. Net income was $1 billion, compared with $606 million the year before, making the site wildly profitable. However, using simple math, Facebook is averaging just over $1 profit per user, a very low number by any metric.
Social gaming giant Zynga "accounted for approximately 12 percent of its revenue in 2011," showing how strongly the gaming company's fate is tied to Facebook.
When the company goes public, it will raise $5 billion, with a company valuation over $75 billion. CEO and founder Mark Zuckerberg has a 28.4 percent stake in the company, making him one of the richest men in the world. The valuation will put Facebook squarely ahead of most major companies in the world.