China’s Weibo Corp’s IPO could value company at $1.6 billion

China’s Weibo Corp stated that it expected its initial public offering of 20 million American Depository Shares to be priced at $17-$19 each, valuing the Twitter’s Doppelganger of a messaging service at approximately $1.66 billion.

The IPO is projected to raise about $380 million at the top end of the expected price range.

Weibo which from its barrio is owned by Sina Corp, is the most recent Chinese internet giant to tap U.S. markets, following on the heels of search service Baidu and its own corporate parent.

Alibaba Group Holding Ltd, which owns a stake in Weibo, is estimated to raise about $15 billion in New York this year, in the biggest internet IPO ever since Facebook‘s debut in 2012.

Sina, which from its part holds about 78 percent of Weibo, would see its stake drop to about 57 percent after the offering.

Weibo from its barrio intends to list its common stock on the NASDAQ under the symbol “WB.”

The number of Chinese companies looking to list shares on the U.S. exchanges have risen steadily since last year in the face of simmering concerns among investors about Chinese accounting standards.

Weibo’s advertising and marketing revenue rose almost three times to $148.42 million in fiscal 2013.

Total revenue rose to $188.3 million in fiscal 2013 from $65.9 million despite the fact that net loss narrowed to $38.1 million from $102.5 million.

Goldman Sachs (Asia) LLC and Credit Suisse are the lead underwriters for the offering.