LinkedIn stock surges on rumor of Facebook partnership

Market rumors suggest that LinkedIn is getting ready to announce some kind of partnership with Facebook, possibly something to do with job listings. That's right: the biggest online business networking tool may be striking a deal with the world's biggest social network.

In the financial world, this has resulted in a lot of speculation and a surge in investor interest. Just yesterday, LinkedIn's stock was up 3.43 percent to $87.38. Still, this is nowhere near LinkedIn's peak stock price on July 15 ($109.97).

The professional networking company was founded in December 2002, and thenlaunched its website in May 2003. Eight years later, LinkedIn filed for an IPO in January 2011 and traded its first shares in May 2011. The company's shares, which were initially priced at $45, surged on the first day by doubling in offering price, and eventually settled in the $80 range.

LinkedIn has somewhere over 100 million registered users. Facebook has 750 million active users. The former likely wants to leverage the latter's user base to drive traffic to its site, while Facebook probably wants to offer yet another service to its members.

See also:

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• LinkedIn's IPO: A proxy for an eventual Facebook IPO
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