France's Nouveau Marché will try to get trading underway in stock market newcomer Artprice.com today after dealings had to be halted before they began yesterday as huge demand twice triggered trading controls.

The price has already hit €42.88 (£26) - more than double the price at which shares were initially offered to investors and looks set to surge higher today.

Under stock market rules shares are temporarily suspended if the price rises too fast. For public offers the initial ceiling is 20% after which a further 20% rise triggers a second suspension of dealings.

For Artprice.com, the online fine art auction database, exchange authorities had widened the 20% bands to allow a price jump of up to 50% but even that proved insufficient to allow trading to start. The price immediately hit the first stop of €28.59.

"The demand was so strong we decided to allow a further 50% price rise but we could not trade even at this price," an exchange spokesman said.

This morning the exchange will allow a further 50% appreciation and if that is not sufficient to get trading under way it will allow the price to rise another 50%.

Artprice.com is the first pure dot.com to hit the French market and demand for the shares on offer has been huge. According to the offer's lead manager, Europe Finance and Industrie, the institutional element was 70 times oversubscribed. Retail demand was also strong. Only 5% of bids for up to 100 shares and none of the bids for more than 100 shares could be met.