The website, which connects individuals with colleagues, contacts and friends and primarily acts as a live curriculum vitae, sold the stake to Tiger Global Management, one of the offshoot 'tiger cubs' of Julian Robertson's legendary Tiger Management fund.
Tiger Global is understood to have paid $20m for its stake in LinkedIn, buying approximately 1pc for $21.50 a share.
This values the private company at $2.26bn, based on 105m shares outstanding.
The shares are believed to have been bought from current shareholders, rather then being newly issued.
LinkedIn, which has in excess of 70m members in over 200 countries, is often touted as a future initial public offering candidate, and the firm last month admitted it has received calls from a number of investment banks offering to work with it on a stock market float.
The company raised $78m from investors during two rounds of funding in 2008, however Jeff Weiner, chief executive, told Bloomberg last month that it has not been touched. Investors who came on board during those rounds included Sequoia Capital – one of Google's early investors – and Bain Capital. However the company does have plans to continue to grow, increasing its staff of 600 to 900 by the end of 2010, as the number of users, particularly in developing countries, rises.
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