The company’s filing to the New York Stock Exchange has already raised eyebrows after revealing that losses have widened each year and stating that it “may never achieve or maintain profitability” reports the Telegraph.
The five-year-old business, which is expected to be valued at between $20bn and $25bn, is the most highly anticipated float since Chinese online giant Alibaba debuted three years ago.
The NYSE filing revealed that Snap, which recently rebranded itself as a “camera company”, is planning to raise $3bn.
Snap revealed that it has 158 million daily active users in the quarter to 31 December, a 48 per cent increase on the previous year. Meanwhile sales, which are primarily generated through advertising, jumped to $404.5m in 2016 from $58.7m in 2015.
However, the company revealed that losses swelled to $514.6m in the year to December 31 from $306.6m the year before.
“We began commercial operations in 2011 and for all of our history we have experienced net losses and negative cash flows from operations”, Snap said.
Last month Snapchat revealed that it would set up an international base in London and will book sales from outside of the US in the UK, meaning that Britain will receive corporation tax on the sales.
Snap has 75 employees in the UK and plans to expand in the future, as well as more than 10 million daily users.
