Facebook IPO Hits Third-Biggest Of All Time [Live Stream]

Today's Initial Public Offering of the social network known as Facebook has already set their stock up in the record books as the third largest IPO in history behind Visa and Enel. If Facebook's stock does sit at $16 billion as projected, it will be just behind Enel, an electric utility part-owned by the Italian government which earned $16.5 billion at its own IPO. Facebook is currently not projected to reach much higher than that, with Visa's 2008 IPO at $17.9 billion USD keeping the high mark extremely high, as it were.

Facebook today beats the likes of Deutsche Telekom which generated $13 billion back in 1996 as well as General Motors which grabbed $15.8 billion in 2010. Facebook's stock offering starts at $38 USD per share with 421.2 million shares, but is it possible that should demand be high enough, underwriters could purchase more stock and drive the price through the roof. Meanwhile we must expect Mark Zuckerberg is running around in circles and jumping for joy no matter the news – see the NASDAQ live-feed here via Livefeed:

For those of you wondering, Facebook's stock ticker code is indeed FB, and Mark Zuckerberg himself did ring the starting bell today. This bell-ringing took place from Facebook's own Menlo Park, California headquarters and the whole tech community is currently digging their fingernails into their knees at what will easily be the largest tech-centric IPO in the history of the United States. Stay tuned as trading begins and the price shoots!