Companies do do that. The first sale is called the primary offering, and ones that come after are called secondaries (or follow-on). I'm not sure if LinkedIn w

Companies do do that. The first sale is called the primary offering, and ones that come after are called secondaries (or follow-on). I'm not sure if LinkedIn will do that, but it's common among small companies that are capital intensive. Usually the goal is not to capture the fluctuation in short-term price, but rather the long-term appreciation from demonstration of potential. For example, if Tesla sold everything when it IPOed, it would be unlikely to get a good price for it, not to mention it doesn't need all that cash now so it's somewhat wasteful. But if it sold half then and sold half in early 2012 or so, it will be able to (hopefully) get a better deal in the second chunk. Back to the issue of short term mispricing, companies like Google hold open Dutch auctions so the actual price is very close to the fair market value. I don't know why LinkedIn didn't do that but I suspect it's because it wants to keep good relations with bankers. I hope that answered your question.