Sources: Snapchat talking to investment bankers about filing for an IPO later this year or early 2017 but hasn't yet settled on a bank
The Information :
Context & Ripple Effects
This is the opening move in a fast-moving arc: within a day, Snapchat had taken out a credit line with Morgan Stanley and other banks, putting the same institutions that would underwrite its listing on its balance sheet before any mandate was decided.
The banker talks resolved quickly — by mid-October Snap had picked Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs as lead underwriters with a March 2017 target, reports put the valuation at $25B+, and by November the company had filed confidentially. The September indecision over which bank to hire was the last open question before the process went quiet.
First-order effects
- Morgan Stanley enters the bake-off with an inside track: the credit line already gives it visibility into Snap's finances that rival banks lack.
- Snap gains a formal path to public-market capital while retaining leverage — with no bank chosen, it can still shop the mandate for better fees and allocation promises.
Second-order effects
- Whoever wins the lead role gets marquee branding on what reports suggest could be a $25B+ offering, intensifying fee competition among top-tier banks for other late-stage mandates.
- A March 2017 window would force other large private consumer-internet companies weighing listings to time their own filings against Snap's debut rather than risk being crowded out.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds — banker courtship, then a quick mandate, then a confidential filing ahead of a spring listing — it becomes the template late-stage consumer apps follow to go public without a prolonged roadshow.
- A successful Snap listing at the reported valuation would reset what public markets will pay for high-growth, unprofitable social platforms, shaping pricing for the next cohort of candidates.
The trend: Late-stage consumer internet companies are returning to public markets through a compressed playbook — bank courtship, confidential filing, quick listing — with Snap as the test case.