Snapchat Reportedly Prepares for the IPO, Estimated Value at $25 billion

Snapchat was reported to have confidentially filed the paperwork for an initial public offering, according to reports on Tuesday.

CNBC said the company, which lets users send disappearing photos and recently changed its name to Snap Inc., had begun the process of going public. However, Snapchat declined to comment. Snap Inc CEO Evan Spiegel said at a May 2015 tech conference: 'We need to IPO, we have a plan to do that. An IPO is really important.'

The company has gained traction with young people and its user base has swelled to some 150 million daily active users. Snapchat recently shared that it would make its first venture into hardware by selling video-capturing glasses out of vending machines for $129.99.

According to Bloomberg, an IPO by Snapchat is highly anticipated and is expected to raise as much as $4 billion. That would give the company a valuation of $25 billion to $35 billion. After raising some $2.4 billion in funding to-date, Snapchat currently fetches a valuation of roughly $18 billion.

Snapchat's revenue could total $366.7 million this year, according to a report from eMarketer. The firm expects Snapchat's revenue to climb to nearly $1 billion in 2017. A September report from eMarketer said: 'Worldwide, it will generate $366.69 million in ad revenues this year, with that figure jumping to $935.46 million in 2017.'

Snap users was estimated to be more than 100 million users globally of the service for sending videos, images and text messages which vanish after being viewed. Some reports say it generates 10 billion video views per day.

Meanwhile, current year's largest public offering was from Chinese logistics company "ZTO Express," which delivers packages ordered off "Alibaba" and other sites, and raised $1.4 billion in its New York Stock Exchange debut in October, according to Forbes. The largest tech IPO in 2016 was from "Line," another messaging app, which is popular in Asia.