Airbnb is trying to ride the soaring stock market to a comeback.
The home rental start-up said on Tuesday that it intends to sell shares at between $44 and $50 each in its initial public offering, valuing it as high as nearly $35 billion.
The company said it plans to raise as much as $2.75 billion from the offering, according to a prospectus filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Its three founders also plan to sell stock that may be valued at as much as $95 million.
Such a sale would return Airbnb’s valuation to where it was before the pandemic battered its business. At the beginning of the year, investors had valued the company at $31 billion. But in the spring, with travel halted and cancellations pouring in, Airbnb raised emergency funding valuing it at $18 billion.
Airbnb is betting that Wall Street will buy into its narrative of a rebounding business. Even though its revenue shrank in the first nine months of the year compared to the same period last year, bookings in the most recent three-month period recovered as people took road trips to home rentals in remote areas.
Airbnb now plans to embark on a virtual “road show” to pitch its stock to investors over the next week, culminating with its shares listing on Nasdaq under the symbol “ABNB.”
The company is among a flock of high-profile tech companies going public before the end of the year. On Monday, the food delivery company DoorDash said it hoped to raise up to $2.8 billion from its I.P.O., in a sale that could value the company at as much as $31.6 billion. E-commerce company Wish and children’s game maker Roblox are expected to list their shares in the coming weeks.
Michael J. de la Merced contributed reporting.
Be the first to comment