The IPO Buzz: Life Beyond Alibaba

Before going forward, let’s take a backward glance at the two other billion-dollar IPOs, Google (GOOGL)and Facebook (FB), and how each affected the calendar.

 

Google priced its IPO of 19.6 million shares at $85 each on Aug. 18, 2004, to raise $1.67 billion. It was the only deal priced that week, according to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filings. And just one IPO was priced the following week. It was on Aug. 26, 2004. The market closed down until Sept. 14.

The Reason: The three-week gap between the two dates was due to the Labor Day holiday break from mid-August to mid-September.

 

Facebook priced its IPO of 421.2 million shares at $38 each on May 17, 2012, to raise $16 billion. The next IPO was priced on June 27, 2012.

 

The Reason: A six-week correction had wrapped its fingers around the stock market, beginning on April 2, 2012, when the NASDAQ Composite Index lost 11.9 percent. On April 2, the NASDAQ closed at 3,119.70; on June 1, 2012, the index bottomed out at 2,747.48. It took about four weeks for the IPO market to recover from the selloff.

 

The Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 Index closed on Friday, Sept. 19, at record highs. The NASDAQ Composite Index ended at a 14-year high earlier in the week. This is the fuel that the IPO fire needs to burn brighter  – and the week after Alibaba it is primed for action.

 

Among the 12 IPOs looking to raise $6.9 billion are two billion-dollar deals, a couple of pharmaceutical companies and a technology deal that is reportedly on many “most wanted” lists.

 

Citizens Financial Group (CFG – proposed), based in Providence, Rhode Island, believes it is the 13^th-largest retail bank holding company in the United States. The bank provides retail and commercial banking products and services to about 5 million individuals, institutions and companies through its 1,370 branches in 12 states in the New England, Mid-Atlantic and Midwest regions. Citizens Financial has over 80 retail and commercial non-branch offices in five states and the District of Columbia. The bank holding company plans to offer 140 million shares at $23 to $25 each to raise $3.36 billion.

(For more information, please click here: Citizens Financial Group)

 

Grupo Aval Acciones y Valores S.A. (AVAL – proposed), headquartered in Bogota, believes it is Colombia’s largest banking group, when ranked by total assets. It is the largest banking group in Central America, based on total assets. The bank provides a comprehensive range of financial services and products ranging from traditional banking services, such as making loans and taking deposits, to pension and severance fund management. Grupo Aval plans to offer 73.5 million American Depositary Shares at $14.96 each to raise $1.1 billion. (For more information, please click here: Grupo Aval Acciones y Valores S.A.)

 

(Note: Grupo Aval’s shares are listed on the Colombian Stock Exchange under the symbol “PFAVAL.” Some services call this an IPO, but its underlying shares can be bought on its national stock exchange. Other services call this a secondary offering.)

 

Civitas Therapeutics (CVTS – proposed), based in Chelsea, Massachusetts ,  is a biopharmaceutical company focused on developing transformative therapeutics using its proprietary ARCUS technology, with an initial focus on treating debilitating OFF episodes, the unpredictable re-emergence of symptoms in patients with Parkinson’s disease.

(For more information, please click here: Civitas Therapeutics)

 

Vitae Pharmaceuticals (VTAE – proposed) is a Fort Washington, Pennsylvania-based clinical stage biotechnology company focused on developing a robust and growing portfolio of novel product candidates generated by Contour, its proprietary structure-based drug discovery platform. The company believes its most advanced product candidates include VTP-34072, which began the first Phase 2 clinical trial for the treatment of Type 2 diabetes in July 2014, with data expected in the first half of 2015, and VTP-37948, which is in Phase 1 clinical trials for the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease, with data expected in the second half of 2014. Both products are being developed by Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH, or BI, under separate collaborations.

(For more information, please click here: Vitae Pharmaceuticals)

CyberArk Software (CYBR – proposed) is an Israeli-based provider of what it believes to be a new layer of IT security solutions to protect organizations from cyber-attacks. The company supplies software solutions to the financial services, energy, retail and healthcare industries. At March 31, 2014, CyberArk Software had about 1,500 customers.

(For more information, please click here: CyberArk Software)

 

Looking into the week of Sept. 29, 2014, the calendar has five deals with bankers planning to raise about $1.67 billion. But more names could pop onto the calendar by the time that Monday, Sept. 29, rolls around.

 

Stay tuned.