Snap has taken the first step to listing publicly, but its giving little away to investors

The number of Snap's daily active users grew to an average of 158 million at the end of December, up 48 per cent year-on-year

Snap xxxxx (Getty)

Snapchat owner Snap fired the opening salvo in its $3bn initial public offering on Thursday, outlining aggressive expansion plans but offering new investors no say on how the company is run and no promise of profits.

Snap's publication on Thursday of its IPO registration document sets the stage for its upcoming marketing campaign to convince investors to look past its widening losses and the firm grip of its founders, and focus on its rapid growth of active users.

The number of Snap's daily active users grew to an average of 158 million at the end of December, up 48 per cent year-on-year, Snap revealed. However, its net loss widened to $514.6m in 2016 from $372.9m the year before.

While Snap will have time to polish its marketing pitch in the run-up to the IPO planned for March, some analysts were taken aback that the company was just beginning to reap cash from its product.

"What surprises me the most is that it is still very early days when it comes to Snap making money," said Rohit Kulkarni, managing director at private securities investment firm SharesPost.

Snap had confidentially registered with the US Securities and Exchange Commission for an IPO late last year. It kept the filing under such tight wraps, even some of its IPO underwriters had not seen it prior to publication on Thursday, sources familiar with the matter previously told Reuters.

Snap said in the IPO registration document published on Thursday it would become the first US company to go public with shares on offer not granting voting rights to stock market investors. Its founders, Evan Spiegel and Robert Murphy, will keep control of the company.

Snap could be valued at between $20bn to $25bn, according to sources familiar with the situation who asked not to be named because the matter is confidential. That would give the company the richest valuation in a US technology IPO since Facebook.

Snap, which launched itself in 2012 with an app that sends disappearing messages, rebranded itself last year as a camera company and started selling $130 video camera glasses. It generates the majority of its revenue from advertising, seeking to challenge the dominance of internet giants such as Facebook and Alphabet’s Google.

"The industry has been crying out for new advertising units" says Ian Schafer, founder and chairman of ad agency Deep Focus, referring to the tight hold Facebook and Google have on the digital advertising marketplace.

In its IPO registration document, Snap cited Apple, Google, Twitter, Facebook and its photo-sharing platform Instagram as its competitors.

Reuters