Americana IPO covered within hours of its launch

Americana Restaurants on Monday priced its initial public offering (IPO) between Dh2.50 to Dh2.62 per share which was covered within hours of its launch.

The company, which is valued between Dh21.06 billion to Dh22.07 billion, is looking to raise as much as Dh6.6 billion through the share sale.

The company expects to sell 2.527 billion shares, representing 30 per cent of its issued share capital. The final offer price is expected to be announced on November 23, 2022.

The offering subscription period is expected to run from November 14 until November 21 for retail investors and from November 14 until November 22 for institutional investors.

The company, which operates global F&B brands such as KFC and Pizza Hut, had earlier announced plans for dual listing on the Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange and Saudi Exchange. It expects trading to start on the stock markets on December 6, 2022.

Saudi sovereign wealth fund Public Investment Fund (PIF) and Dubai businessman Mohammed Alabbar are selling their stakes in the F&B giant. Bloomberg on Monday reported that Americana IPO “was covered within hours of the company’s opening books… Order books were multiple times covered across the range

just a few hours after the company opened its books,” it said.

It is intended that five per cent of the total offering will be allocated to the UAE retail investors and up to 10 per cent will be allocated to the Saudi retail investors and 85 per cent will be allocated to the institutional investors.

The F&B giant will take a call on increasing or decreasing the size of the offer at any time prior to the end of the subscription period. However, it will not increase the size of the UAE retail offer above 10 per cent of the total offer shares or reduce the size of the institutional offer to less than 80 per cent of the total offer shares.

First Abu Dhabi Bank, Goldman Sachs International, Morgan Stanley & Co. International, and SNB Capital have been appointed as joint global coordinators and financial advisors. HSBC Bank Middle East Limited and EFG Hermes UAE Limited have been appointed as joint book-runners and underwriters. Rothschild & Co Middle East has been appointed as an independent financial advisor.