The IPO Buzz: Facebook (Finally) Plus 12 IPOs

On Thursday afternoon, May 3, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission posted Facebook’s S-1/A amended filing. It revealed the company was planning to sell 337,415,352 shares of Class A common stock between $28 and $35 per share. That would raise about $10.6 billion, if priced at the mid-point of its price range. The prospectus showed Facebook would have about 2.13 billion shares of Class A and Class B common stock outstanding after the offering. This would give Facebook a market value of slightly over $67.1 billion.

 

The IPO calendar for the week of May 7 lists 12 IPOs. They are expected to raise about $1.4 billion. There are no super-duper blockbusters among them. And the IPO handicappers don’t see any opening-day moonshots either. Nevertheless, they have an eye on a couple. They are Audience and Ignite Restaurant Group.

 

Audience plans to price 5.27 million shares at $14 to $16 each on Wednesday evening. The IPO is expected to start trading Thursday morning on the NASDAQ Global Market under the proposed symbol “ADNC.” The joint-lead managers are J.P. Morgan, Credit Suisse and Deutsche Bank Securities. The co-manager is Pacific Crest Securities.

 

Based in Mountain View, California, Audience believes it is the leading provider of intelligent voice and audio solutions. The company designs and sells its solutions for mobile phones, tablets, laptops, and other consumer devices. Audience, formed in 2000, has about 206 employees.

 

Audience plans to offer 5 million shares and selling shareholders plan to offer 270,000 shares. The company expects to have about 19.4 million shares outstanding after the offering.

 

Audience’s competitors are components of the Dow Jones U.S. Software Index sector. The Index has been an outperformer this year. On Friday, May 4, it was up 17.4 percent for the year versus an 8.87 percent gain by the S&P 500 Index.

  

Ignite Restaurant Group plans to price about 5.8 million shares at $12 to $14 each on Thursday evening. The IPO is expected to start trading Friday morning on the NASDAQ Global Market under the proposed symbol “IRG.” The joint-lead managers are Credit Suisse, Baird and Piper Jaffray. The co-managers are KeyBanc Capital Markets, Lazard Capital Markets and Raymond James.

 

Based in Houston, Ignite Restaurant operates two restaurant businesses: Joe’s Crab Shack and Brick House Tavern+Tap. Founded in 1991, Joe’s Crab Shack operates a chain of 122 casual seafood restaurants in 32 states. Joe’s serves a variety of high-quality seafood items, with an emphasis (naturally) on crabs. Founded in 2008, Brick House Tavern+Tap operates a chain of 16 casual restaurants in nine states. In 2011, Brick House was listed as the No. 1 “up and comer” full-service varied-menu restaurant business by Technomic, a leading restaurant industry consulting and research firm. Ignite Restaurant Group, formed in 1991, has about 10,900 employees.

 

Ignite Restaurant plans to offer about 5.6 million shares and selling shareholders plan to offer 200,000 shares. The company expects to have about 24.8 million shares outstanding after the offering.

 

Ignite Restaurant competitors are components of the Dow Jones U.S. Restaurants & Bars Index sector. The Index has been a laggard this year. On Friday, May 4, it was up 6.65 percent for the year versus an 8.87 percent gain by the S&P 500 Index.

Rounding out this week’s IPO traffic, are another 10 deals. Interestingly enough, three of this week’s offerings were on the IPO calendar for the week of Aug. 8, 2011, and each was postponed due to market conditions:

But they weren’t the only ones voted off the IPO calendar of Aug. 8, 2011. There was another one that made a comeback:

 

HomeStreet  (HMST), a Seattle-based financial service institution, got bounced back from the calendar that week. But its IPO arose from the dead. In February 2012, HomeStreet priced its IPO at $22 per share (adjusted for a two-for-one stock split). It closed on Friday, May 4, at $33.85, UP 53.9 percent from its initial offering price.

 

We can’t close the conversation, though, without circling back to Facebook.

 

Some misguided person will surely claim Facebook is offering 388 million shares at $35 each to raise $13.5 billion. Those figures are in the filing.

 

Here’s where the thinking often goes wrong.

 

Facebook registered the 15 percent over-allotment option of 50.6 million shares and calculated the entire registration on the high end of its $35 per share range. College professors have been known to do the same. More on Facebook next week.

 

Stay tuned.