London: Facebook’s earnings are growing faster than the company had predicted in 2010, leading to speculation that it could be worth as much as 100 billion dollars by next spring.
The Wall Street Journal, citing people who have seen Facebook’s recent financial information, reports that the company is likely to earn more than $ 2 billion in 2011, raising the possibility of it going public in spring 2012.
It would make Facebook one of the biggest technology companies in the world, overtaking Amazon and Cisco.
That estimate puts its profits far above the numbers Facebook released in January 2011 when Goldman Sachs and Russian investment firm Sky Technologies invested 1.5billion dollars in the firm.
The terms of their investment implied it could be worth as much as 50 billion dollars.
Facebook’s rapid growth has fuelled a scramble among investors to buy shares in the company while it remains private.
Much of its success is down to its huge advertising revenue, which is predicted to hit 4.05 billion dollars this year, up from 1.86 billion dollars in 2010, according to EMarketer.
It has also made extra money from its own payments system, called Credits, for which it takes a 30 percent cut.
The people who leaked the figures stressed that it was difficult to assess Facebook`s value, because it will depend on the economic mood at the time of its IPO.
ANI
