Japan Airlines Co Ltd <9201.T> set the pre-market price for its initial public offering at the top end of the range, raising $8.5 billion for state coffers in a sign of solid demand for the world's second-largest IPO this year.

Japan Airlines (JAL), which has emerged from its 2010 bankruptcy with a clean balance sheet and industry topping profits, set the IPO price at 3,790 yen ($48.55) per share on Monday after gauging investor demand at 3,500 to 3,790 yen. It will list on the Tokyo Stock Exchange on September 19.

At the pre-market price, the company will raise 663 billion yen ($8.49 billion), nearly double the 350 billion yen injected by a Japanese government-backed fund following the airline's failure with $25 billion in debts in early 2010.

The fund, the Enterprise Turnaround Initiative Corporation of Japan (ETIC), is selling its 96.5 percent stake in Japan Airlines in the IPO, which ranks second this year behind the $16 billion offering by social network giant Facebook Inc.

Attractive valuations and a strong balance sheet, bolstered by massive debt forgiveness in the wake of its failure, are expected to ensure the JAL offering fares better than that of Facebook, which was marred by an exchange system glitch.