Facebook halted trading of its shares in secondary markets for three days starting Wednesday, a possible indicator the company's long-awaited IPO is coming soon, according to a report.
Representatives of Facebook's law firm, Fenwick & West, sent a letter last week to at least one of the markets outlining the move, according to Bloomberg report, which cites "people with knowledge of the matter." The letter did not explain the reason behind the decision.
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According to a recent report, Facebook's $100 billion IPO is expected to hit in late May. However, an analyst interviewed by Bloomberg speculated that Facebook may be ceasing trading to pave the way for its IPO.
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“Facebook and companies who do this don’t want to expose themselves to lawsuits related to the fact that some people had it before others and were able to trade on it,” Sam Hamadeh, CEO of PrivCo. told Bloomberg. “The best way to protect yourself is to have no one able to trade.”
However, people interviewed for the article stressed that the halting of trading in secondary markets doesn't necessarily mean that the company's IPO is imminent.
Reps from Facebook could not be reached for comment on the report.
Facebook shares have been trading on the secondary markets for years. Under U.S. laws, such trading is possible if there are fewer than 500 investors. At presstime, Facebook's "implied valuation," as computed by a secondary market, Sharespost, was $81.2 billion. If that value holds, Facebook's will be among the top 20 IPOs of all time.
How the Social Media IPOs of 2011 Fared:
1. Yandex (YNDX) -20.8% from its IPO Price
Yandex, a Russian search engine, raised $1.3 billion when it went public in May, making it the biggest social media IPO of the year.
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This story originally published on Mashable here.
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