Mynt, the parent company of Philippine mobile wallet GCash, has priced its initial public offering at ₱6.60 per share, Reuters reported on Thursday, citing two sources with knowledge of the matter. The pricing would raise about ₱53 billion in a deal expected to rank among the largest share sales on record in the Philippines.
Mynt has not confirmed the figure. Asked to verify the price, the company said it was “unable to comment on market speculation.” “Stakeholders should refer to the disclosures made through official announcements only,” the company added.
Offer size and structure
Mynt plans to sell up to 8.03 billion shares. The offer consists of up to 1.61 billion new shares and up to 6.42 billion shares sold by an existing shareholder, based on stock exchange records reported by Philippine Star. If the overallotment option covering up to 1.2 billion additional shares is fully exercised, total proceeds could reach about ₱60.9 billion.
At the dollar conversion used by Reuters, the base offer of about ₱53 billion equals roughly $846 million.
The reported price is below the maximum offer price of ₱10 per share set in the preliminary prospectus, a difference of 34 percent. At that ceiling, Mynt would have been valued at about ₱669 billion.
Cornerstone investors
Cornerstone investors are large institutions that commit to buying shares before an IPO opens to the public. They have agreed to buy ₱36.5 billion of shares in the offering, based on the preliminary prospectus dated September 22.
The foreign investors named in the prospectus are Capital Research and Management Company, Citadel Multi-Strategy Equities Master Fund Ltd, FIL Investment Management (Hong Kong), HSBC Global Asset Management, International Finance Corporation and Lazard Asset Management. The domestic investors are ATRAM Trust Corporation, BPI Asset Management and Trust Corporation and China Bank Capital Corporation. Reuters earlier reported that more than 20 cornerstone investors, including BlackRock and T. Rowe Price, had been lined up.
Philippine market context
Companies in the Philippines have raised just $227.1 million through equity capital market transactions this year as of September 29, based on LSEG data. Mynt is a partnership of Globe Telecom, the Ayala Group and Ant Financial.
Mynt has said proceeds from the sale of new shares will be used to expand its digital financial services business, develop products and for general corporate purposes.
Schedule
The public offer period runs from October 6 to 12, and shares are scheduled to begin trading on the Philippine Stock Exchange on October 20 under the ticker GCASH. Mynt is due to submit its notice of the final offer price to the PSE and the Securities and Exchange Commission on October 2.
