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Etsy IPO Could Value Company at $1.78 Billion

That's 77 times the company's annual profit.

Charles & Hudson / Flickr / Creative Commons

Etsy, which operates a website that sells handmade goods and craft supplies, said Tuesday its initial public offering was expected to be priced at $14-$16 per share.

The offering of 16.66 million common shares is expected to raise about $266.65 million at the top end of the expected range, valuing Etsy at about $1.78 billion.

The company, which has 1.4 million active sellers and 19.8 million active buyers as of December, counts venture capital firm Accel Partners, Index Ventures, Union Square Ventures and hedge fund Tiger Global Management as its major investors.

Accel Partners’ stake would drop to 22.4 percent from 27 percent after the offering, while Union Square’s stake would drop to 12.6 percent from 15.2 percent.

Brooklyn, New York-based Etsy is offering 13.33 million shares, the company said in a regulatory filing on Tuesday, with the rest of the shares coming from existing stockholders.

Etsy, which has 29 million items listed on its website, charges a 20-cent listing fee for each item and a 3.5 percent fee for each completed sale. It also earns revenue from its advertising platform, payment processing and shipping labels.

Etsy employed 685 people as of December and reported gross merchandise sales of $1.93 billion in 2014.

The company, led by former Yahoo executive Chad Dickerson, said net loss widened to $15.24 million in 2014 from $796,000 a year earlier. Revenue rose 56.4 percent to $195.59 million.

Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and Allen & Co. are underwriting the IPO.

(Reporting by Avik Das in Bengaluru; Editing by Don Sebastian)

This article originally appeared on Recode.net.