Facebook on track to raise $16 billion through IPO | WPN World People News

Facebook made its Wall Street debut Friday with the world's number one online social networking giant in third biggest initial public offerings in the US stock history.

Facebook's stock market debut was preceded by a breathless hype but its shares stayed fairly stable, trading Friday morning right around their IPO price that is $38 per share.

The shares jumped more than 10 per cent to $42 within minutes of the opening on the Nasdaq exchange but they later fell back to trade flat.

At the $38 IPO price, Facebook is on track to raise $16 billion.

CEO Mark Zuckerberg, 28, who started Facebook while at university, remotely opened trading on the Nasdaq earlier. He appeared via a video link from a celebration at the firm's headquarters in California.

Valued at $104 billion, Facebook is larger than Starbucks and Hewlett-Packard combined.

Strong demand had led the company to increase both the price and the number of shares available for sale. Facebook's owners are releasing just under a fifth of the company's total shares, about 421 million, which could raise about $18 billion.

According to CNNMoney, the trading was fast and intense as over 80 million shares changed hands in the first 30 seconds of trading, and within 45 minutes, the volume had spiked to 247 million shares.

It's the third largest US IPO, trailing only the $19.7 billion raised by Visa in March 2008 and the $18.1 billion raised by automaker General Motors in November 2010, according to Reuters.

Source: Financial Services Industry News.Net