IPO News This Week: Tech Unicorn Pluralsight Highlights 3 Offerings

May 13, 2018 by Paul Ausick

Last week’s initial public offering (IPO) calendar included five firms looking to enter the public markets. Four of the five were successful and raised a total of more than $3.1 billion in new capital. For the year to date, the U.S. IPO market has raised more capital than any similar period since 2008. The coming week includes three firms seeking about $728 million in new capital from the public markets.

HUYA Inc. (NYSE: HUYA) raised $180 million by selling 15 million American Depositary Shares (ADS) at $12, the high end of the prospective range. The shares got a first-day pop of 34% on the Friday IPO.

Origin Bancorp Inc. (NASDAQ: OBNK) raised $124 million by selling 3.6 million shares at $34, the midpoint of the expected range. Shares popped 10% on the first day of trading and closed the week up 9%.

AXA Equitable Holdings Inc. (NYSE: EQH) raised $2.75 billion with the saled of 137.3 million shares at $20, well below the expected range of $24 to $27. Shares got a first-day pop of $2% and closed the week up 7%.

Evelo Biosciences Inc. (NASDAQ: EVLO) raised $85 million selling 5.3 million shares at $16, the midpoint of the expected range. The stock got a first-day pop of 2% but closed the week flat with its offering price.

Through the week ending May 11, IPO ETF manager Renaissance Capital reported that 68 IPOs have priced in the U.S. so far this year, up about 21% year over year. Total proceeds raised through last week equaled $22.4 billion, up about 37% year over year.

For 2017, Renaissance Capital reported a total of 160 IPOs, up 52% year over year from 105 in 2016. Total 2017 proceeds amounted to $35.5 billion compared with a 2016 total of $18.8 billion. Renaissance Capital does not include “best efforts” or blank-check companies in its totals, nor does it include IPOs that raise less than $10 million.

Here are the three companies looking to raise new capital in the coming week.

Trinity Merger Corp. is a blank-check company formed by Trinity Investments to acquire a real estate business. The firm plans to offer 30 million units comprising one share of class A common stock and one warrant at $10 per unit to raise $300 million. Sole underwriter for the offering is B. Riley & Co. Units are scheduled to begin trading Tuesday on the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol TMCXU.

VectoIQ is also a blank-check company formed by former GM executives planning to focus on the smart transportation business. The firm plans to offer 20 million units comprising one share of common stock and three-quarters of a redeemable warrant at $10 per unit to raise $200 million. Underwriters are Cowen & Company and Chardan Capital Markets. Units are scheduled to begin trading Tuesday on the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol VTIQU.

Pluralsight Inc. provides online training in programming and software development. The company plans to offer $20.7 million shares in an expected range of $10 to $12 to raise $228 million at a market cap of $1.53 billion. Underwriters include Morgan Stanley, J.P. Morgan, Barclays, BofA/Merrill Lynch, First Analysis Securities, Needham & Company, Raymond James, and SunTrust Robinson Humphrey. Shares are set to price Wednesday and begin trading Thursday on the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol PS.

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