Higher and higher: Karman Holdings (KRMN), an aerospace and defense contractor, upsized its IPO to 23.0 million shares – up from 21.05 million shares in the prospectus – and priced the IPO at $22.00 – $2.00 above the top of its $18.00-to-$20.00 price range – to raise $506 million on Wednesday night, Feb. 12, 2025. Karman’s stock surged in its New York Stock Exchange debut – opening at $30.00 – up $8.00 from its IPO price – for a 36.4 percent gain at its first trade today – Thursday, Feb. 13. Karman’s stock was trading at $28.50, up $6.50 from its IPO price, at around 12:21 p.m. EST today on NYSE volume of about 4.96 million shares.
Citigroup led the joint book-running team, which included Evercore ISI, RBC Capital Markets and William Blair.
Trive Capital, a private equity firm based in Dallas, Texas, is a principal shareholder. After the IPO, affiliates of Trive Capital Management LLC will own a majority of the voting power of the stock, according to the prospectus.
Karman Holdings, based in Huntington Beach, California, designs, tests, manufactures and sells “mission-critical systems for existing and emerging missile and defense, and space programs,” the prospectus said. “Our integrated payload protection, propulsion, and interstage system solutions are deployed across a wide variety of existing and emerging programs supporting important Department of Defense (“DoD”) and space sector initiatives.”
Karman Holdings’ clients include Northrop Grumman and Lockheed Martin, according to Karman’s website.
IPO investors gravitated to Karman’s IPO because of its sector and its profitability.
“There’s going to be increased spending” in the space and defense sector under President Trump, a veteran IPO pro said.
For the 12 months that ended Sept. 30, 2024, Karman Holdings earned net income of $15.04 million on revenue of $331.01 million, according to financial statements in the prospectus.
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