Twitter could be worth $11bn as it prepares to go public next year

According to a report by financial research specialists Greencrest, Twitter is preparing to take the company public and could be worth as much as $11 billion.

Greencrest, who analyse companies they think are close to floating on the stock exchange, say Twitter’s value has also inflated by speculation that Apple is interested in acquiring the company.

“Twitter is up since the Facebook IPO and is now valued at northward of $11bn,” said analyst Max Wolff. “This makes sense as growth in users and new monetisation efforts are both yielding fruit and pointing toward a good 2013 for Twitter.”

The news, broken by Forbes, comes as new hires of executive managers have been made and refinements to Twitter’s photo app are helping it to compete with Facebook owned Instagram.

Most importantly for investors, notes Forbes, Twitter is getting better at making money. Its promoted tweets are becoming more focused on users who may actually click the link, it says, and Twitter has a strong partnership with Pinterest.

Twitter currently says there are no firm plans for an IPO.