JAT Holdings’ IPO oversubscribed on opening day

By Hiran H.Senewiratne

A JAT Holdings Ltd. Initial Public Offering (IPO) was successfully oversubscribed on the opening day, which was a tremendous achievement for the company in a situation where the country is heading for a major foreign reserve crisis, stock market analysts said.

In a CSE filing last morning JAT Holdings noted that they have received applications for over Rs. 2.23 billion for the above issues by it and accordingly the issue has been oversubscribed, market analysts said.

The company will issue 89.9 million shares at a price of Rs. 27 to raise Rs. 2.23 billion. Therefore, the issue was to close at 4.30 pm yesterday as per prospectus.

Amid those developments both indices moved upwards yesterday and CSE activities were up by 3 percent during the day. All Share Price Index went up by 46.48 points and S and P SL20 rose by 11.57 points. Turnover stood at Rs. 4.89 billion with four crossings. Those crossings were reported in Commercial Bank, where 3.5 million share volumes crossed for Rs. 304.5 million, its shares traded at Rs. 87, Expolanka one million shares crossed for Rs. 62.4 million, its shares traded at Rs. 62.80, Alumax 3.5 million shares crossed for Rs. 49 million, its shares traded at Rs. 14 and LOLC Holdings 500,000 shares crossed for Rs. 22.75 million, its shares traded at Rs.455.

In the retail market five companies that mainly contributed to the turnover, were Expolanka Rs 1.18 billion (18.3 million shares traded), LOLC Rs. 402.4 million (901,000 shares traded), Dipped Products Rs. 358 million (6.2 million shares traded),Hayleys Rs. 318.7 million (3.9 million shares traded) and Royal Ceramic Rs. 298.4 million (7.8 million shares traded).

Further, a Sanasa Development Bank Secondary Public Offer was announced this week. The company intends to offer 83 million ordinary shares at a share price of Rs. 51.50 to raise Rs. 4.3 billion. The purpose of this move is to enhance future expansion activities and also meet the capital adequacy ratio directed by the Central Bank.

During the day, topmost contributors to the ASPI were, LOLC 15 pts, Expolanka 8.8 pts and Hayleys 5.2 pts. Besides, banking sector share prices saw a slight decline. During the day, 330 million share volumes changed hands in 34206 transactions.