Twitter has added an investment banker to its staff. This has prompted speculation that the company may begin the process for an initial public offering.

Of course, investors could be gun-shy after the collapses of the share prices of Facebook Inc. (NASDAQ: FB), Groupon Inc. (NASDAQ: GRPN) and Zynga Inc. (NASDAQ: ZNGA). Twitter has not demonstrated that it can bring in a critical mass of advertising, at least not enough for it to be considered a large media company. Analysts estimate that the company could be worth $10 billion currently, which may be much to pricey for Wall Street.

The New York Times says of the new Twitter corporate development chief:

The company has hired Cynthia Gaylor, a managing director at Morgan Stanley, to be its head of corporate development, Alexander Macgillivray, Twitter’s chief lawyer, said in a tweet on Thursday.

Adding:

Over her career, Ms. Gaylor has worked on technology deals including the sale of Zappos to Amazon.com, according to her profile on LinkedIn. More recently, she has advised on financing transactions like initial public offerings.

Among her clients are Facebook, Zynga, Netflix and LinkedIn, the LinkedIn profile says. She joined Morgan Stanley in 2006 after working at Hambrecht & Quist, which became part of JPMorgan Chase.

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