Sun Art Retail Group | |
Value | HK$9.47 billion IPO |
Global coordinators | Citi, HSBC, UBS |
return to the Asian Deals of the Year index |
Good deals were harder to find in the equity world, but they were out there, and a natural standout was Sun Art Retail Group, whose $1.2 billion IPO achieved the rare double act of being good for both issuer and investors. Most deals declined, even tanked; Sun Art priced at HK$7.20 in July and at the time of writing was trading at just under HK$10.
However, this wasn’t a case of leaving money on the table: the deal was priced at the top of its range – 32 times forecast 2011 earnings. So what went right?
"At the time we did the IPO, the market was quite unstable," recalls Jean-Patrick Paufichet, CFO of Sun Art. "In the beginning of June, we tested some investors and made a decision to allocate a big part of the deal to cornerstones, because we realized they were very interested in the company in the long term."