The Secondary Public Offering (SPO) of the government’s residual holding in United Bank Limited (UBL) offered at the ‘floor price’ of Rs155 was declared to have received ‘headline demand’ by the book runners at Rs158, or 2 per cent above the ‘floor’ or minimum price.
A ‘ticker’ running on the website of the Karachi Stock Exchange at 11.45pm announced: “Book runners have received headline demand in excess of the full deal size (base of 160m shares and upsize of 81.9m shares) at Rs158. We have seen strong interest from international and domestic investors in the final hour of book building with over 200 lines currently in the book. Books shut at 9pm Pakistan time.”
The previous midnight, a letter was released to the stock exchanges by the Ministry of Finance, Revenue, and Economic affairs, statistics and Privatisation (Privatisation Commission) in relation to the floor price of the offer for sales of government’s residual shareholding in the UBL had notified: “The Cabinet Committee of Privatisation and Privatisation Commission Board in its meeting held on June 10 (Tuesday) have considered and approved the minimum price/floor price of Rs155 per share for the offer.”
The SPO of government’s residual 19.8pc shareholding in the UBL dominated the news flow at the market. The offer comprises 160m shares representing 13.1pc of the total paid-up capital of the bank with an upsize option of additional 81.9m shares representing 6.7pc of the total paid-up capital.
