Airbnb plans to raise price target range for IPO: source

[MIAMI] Airbnb has plans to raise the target price range for its initial public offering (IPO) to between US$56 and US$60 per share, underscoring demand for new US stocks, a person familiar with the matter said on Sunday.

The US home rental firm had on Tuesday set a price range for its IPO to sell shares at US$44 and US$50 apiece.

Airbnb could communicate the upwardly revised price range to investors in a public filing on Monday, the source added, requesting anonymity as the plans are private.

At the upper end of the new range, Airbnb would sell US$3.1 billion in stock and have a fully diluted valuation, which includes securities such as options and restricted stock units, of US$41.8 billion.

This is well above the US$18 billion Airbnb was worth in an April private fundraising round in the early weeks of the Covid-19 pandemic in the US, and above the US$31 billion in its last pre-Covid-19 fundraising in 2017.

Airbnb's stock market debut, slated for Dec 10 on Nasdaq, will be one of the largest and most anticipated US IPOs of 2020, which has already been a bumper year for flotations.

Record label Warner Music Group, data analytics firm Palantir Technologies and data warehouse company Snowflake Inc have all gone public in the past few months.

Food delivery startup DoorDash Inc on Friday also raised its IPO target price range.

News of the planned IPO price increase was first reported by The Wall Street Journal.

REUTERS