Job Posting May Hint Twitter Heading For IPO
Twitter has posted a job opening this week that may mean it is preparing for an IPO in coming months. The Internet company has been among the most rumored companies threatening to go public in recent months. If they are indeed looking toward a stock market launch, it could come as soon as early 2014.
During an IPO, a business offers shares of stock to the public for the first time through a securities exchange. This is the final step of transforming from a private company to a public company. Facebook went public in May of 2012, and rumors of Twitter following suite quickly surfaced. The company is currently valued at an estimated $10 billion. This means it will most likely be the biggest IPO since Facebook.
For more than a year, Twitter executives have dismissed the possibility of a public offering any time the question has been asked by reporters. Both CEO Dick Costolo and co-founder Jack Dorsey, who still serves on the Twitter board, have denied that the company is considering an IPO. This job posting seems to point otherwise, however.
Twitter, the popular micro-blogging and social networking website, posted the job opening on LinkedIn. The job title is for a "financial reporting manager." The candidate for this position will be responsible for the initial filings for the IPO process.
Unless there is a media announcement in advance of the filing, the first public knowledge of a pending IPO would be when the company files a Preliminary prospectus for its IPO plans. This is known as a Form S-1, and is listed among the job duties for the new position. In addition, the position will be required to prepare monthly reports and quarterly financial statements, according to the job posting.
Twitter, which is headquartered in San Francisco, is one of the top 10 most visited websites on the Internet. It had more than 500 million registered users in 2012, and claimed to have 200 million active users during February of 2013. These users share more than 340 million 140-character text-based messages on the site each day, making it the second most popular social media website in the world.
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