This answers the age-old question that comes up in mid-January: “Where’s the IPO market?” This year’s answer is: “It’s here!”

 

Leading this week’s IPO offerings is a manufacturer of unmanned aircraft or drones called AeroVironment (NASDAQ: AVAV proposed). The deal is on everybody’s “most wanted” list. It is reportedly being touted on late night TV. Enough said?

 

The fertilizer IPO is the unit offering of Converted Organics (NASDAQ: COINU proposed).

 

And the blank checks?

 

The last IPO to make its debut in 2006 was Freedom Acquisition Holdings (AMEX: FRH-U), a Specified Purpose Acquisition Company, or SPAC, otherwise known as a “blank check” company. On Dec. 21, bankers priced 40 million units at $10 each to raise $400 million. That made it the largest SPAC ever. The size of the deal had been increased from its original filing of 37.5 million units at $8 each to raise $300 million.

 

Since being priced, Freedom has traded as high as $10.40, as low as $10 and closed on Jan. 19 at $10.30, UP 3 percent from its initial offering price. That’s better than the underlying stock market, as measured by the Nasdaq Composite Index. It was up 1.49 percent over the same time span.

 

And 2005’s largest SPAC was the Dec. 15 pricing of Endeavor Acquisition (AMEX: EAD-U) of 15 million units at $8 each to raise $120 million.

 

Fast forward to December 2006.

 

On Dec. 19, American Apparel agreed to be acquired by Endeavor for $244 million. Based in Los Angeles, American Apparel operates about 143 retail outlets in the United States and in 14 countries. The company is known for its racy advertising campaigns.

 

On Friday, Jan. 19, 2007, Endeavor’s common stock closed at $10.75 per share. But don’t go away.

 

The December 2005 deal was a unit offering consisting of one share of common stock and one warrant at $8 per unit.

 

On Jan. 19, Endeavor’s units closed at $14.98, UP 87.3 percent from its initial offering price.

 

Bankers plan to price three “blank check” deals this week and another three for the week of Jan. 29, 2007.

 

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Bankers plan to price 14 IPOs during the week of Oct. 16. That is the second-busiest new-issues calendar for 2006. The heaviest was for the week of Jan. 31, when bankers had 15 deals on the launching pad.

 

Interestingly enough, 16 IPOs got priced that week, another nine were priced during the week of Feb. 6 and two more during the week of Feb. 13. By then, the new-issue traffic was drying up.

 

There’s a common thread between the slide in mid-February  and today’s resurgence. It is the Nasdaq Composite Index, the barometer of the IPO market.

 

On Jan. 31, the Nasdaq Composite closed at 2,305.82 and started spinning its wheels into mid-March. On Feb. 9, it had sold down to a close of 2,255.87. And you saw what happened to the IPO Express.

 

On July 21, the Nasdaq Composite closed on its 2006 low at 2,020.38, down 14.8 percent from its closing high of 2,370.88 set on April 19.

 

It normally takes about six to eight weeks for the IPO calendar to stage a comeback after a stock market decline.

 

The six- to eight-week countdown from July 21 took us to Sept. 1 to Sept. 15. Bingo!

 

Since Sept. 15, 22 IPOs have been priced, compared with nine IPOs priced in August, according to available reports.

 

In October, Friday the 13^th was a whirlwind.

 

Here’s what happened. The IPO calendar produced four deals, two skyrocketed for opening-day gains of over 60 percent each and a billion-dollar deal enriched investors with a 21 percent gain.

 

The two superstar deals were classic IPO stories -– technology/Internet companies with booming sales that happen to be highly profitable.

 

Acme Packet (Nasdaq: APKT), a Burlington, Massachusetts-based provider of session border controllers that allows service providers deliver secure and high-quality interactive communications, priced 11.47 million shares at $9.50 each, up from an original filing range of $6.50 to $7.50 per share.

 

Consider this: For the six months ending June 30, 2006, Acme Packet reported net income of $11.3 million on total revenues of $38.1 million, compared with a net loss of $83,000 on total revenues of $16.7 million for the same period a year ago.

 

Acme Packet started trading Friday at $14 per share and closed at $15.91, UP 67.5 percent from its initial offering price.

 

eHealth (Nasdaq: EHTH), a Mountain View, California-based online source of health insurance for individuals, families and small businesses, priced 5 million shares at $14 each, up from an original filing range of $10 to $12 per share.

 

Consider this: For the six months ending June 30, 2006, eHealth reported net income of $2.7 million on total revenues of $27.2 million, compared with a net loss of $209,000 on total revenues of $19.2 million for the same period a year ago.

 

eHealth started trading Friday at $25 per share and closed at $22.90, UP 63.6 percent from its initial offering price.

 

SAIC (NYSE: SAI), a San Diego, California-based defense contractor, priced 75 million shares at $15 each to raise $1.13 billion. That was on the high end of its $13- to $15-per-share filing range.

 

SAIC started trading Friday at $17 per share and closed at $18.18, UP 21.2 percent from its initial offering price.

 

This brings us to this week’s calendar of 14 deals.  

 

There are no outstanding deals, such as last week’s offerings. Three of the 14 IPOs are carryovers from the past, one is a SPAC, or special purpose acquisition company, and 10 are new names on the IPO launching pad.

 

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