LinkedIn share price doubles as New York Stock Exchange opens

LinkedIn saw its share price almost double from its IPO of $45 to a high of $89.87 within three minutes of its debut on the New York Stock Exchange.

The professional social networking site, trading under the ticker symbol LNKD, is now valued at a whopping $8.5bn after selling 7.84 million shares at its IPO, raising $352.8m and valuing the company at around $4.9bn.

LinkedIn had originally planned to sell stock in the $32 to $35 range, but upped this to $42 to $45 at the last minute after strong demand was reported.

The figures make for interesting reading, given that LinkedIn revealed in an SEC filing on Tuesday that it made a profit of just $15m (£9.28m) in 2010 on revenues of $243m.

Numerous other social networks are rumoured to be considered going public, including Twitter, GroupOn and Facebook.

Some estimates suggest that Facebook will announce an IPO within the next 12 months, with valuations potentially as high as $70bn.

Some have argued that the valuations for companies that turn little profit, such as LinkedIn and Skype, which was bought by Microsoft for $8.5bn, are warning signs that another tech bubble is on the horizon, but clearly investors feel differently.