IPOs zoom to 5-year high

The number of companies wanting to cash in on the stock market boom is at a five-year high.

A total of 128 companies had filed offer documents for equity issues with the Securities and Exchange Board of India till December 2.

Of this, 63 companies have already mobilised Rs 18,904 crore (Rs 189.04 billion) from the capital market this year. Five issues are in the market to collect Rs 4,500 crore (Rs 45 billion), taking the total amount to Rs 23,404 crore (Rs 234.04 billion). In the pipeline are 63 issues that plan to mobilise Rs 8,500 crore (Rs 85 billion).

During the information, communication and entertainment boom of 2000, 126 issues had hit the market, but most of them were small in size and could mobilise only Rs 3,254 crore (Rs 32.54 billion).

The markets had seen over 1,000 issues in three consecutive years - 1994, 1995 and 1996. Collectively, 3,492 companies mobilised Rs 16,939 crore (Rs 169.39 billion) through public offerings in those three years.

Of the offer documents filed by 128 companies with Sebi this year, only 13 public offers (eight of them from banks) are by existing listed firms and 115

are initial public offerings. In November alone, the promoters of 16 companies filed drafts of offer documents.

According to data sourced from the Sebi website, the number of companies that filed draft offer documents for public offers in November has been the highest in the last two years.

Entertainment Network, Celebrity Fashions, Inox Leisure, Royal Orchid Hotels, Shirt Company, Space Computer and Systems, Shivalik Global and Rohit Ferro-Tech had filed drafts of offer documents with Sebi last month.

The sectoral classification shows five companies are from the information technology sector, four each from entertainment, steel alloys, textiles and retail business, and three each from the engineering and power sectors.

The list also includes three listed banks - ICICI Bank, Andhra Bank and Bank of Baroda. However, Andhra Bank and Bank of Baroda have not yet decided the price band for raising money through book-building.

Kernex Microsystems is set to raise Rs 99.01 crore (Rs 990 million) at a price band of Rs 225 to Rs 250 per equity share. PVR Ltd has set a price band of Rs 200 to Rs 240 for its 7.70 lakh equity shares.