PETALING JAYA: Leong Hup International Bhd posted mild gains on its debut on Bursa Malaysia today, opening at RM1.12, a 2 sen or 1.8% premium against its offer price of RM1.10.
The stock rose as much as 9 sen or 8.2% to RM1.19 in early trade before paring its gains to close unchanged at RM1.10 on 215.4 million shares done, giving it a market capitalisation of RM4.02 billion.
It is the largest initial public offering (IPO) in Malaysia since the listing of Lotte Chemical Titan Holdings in 2017.
Leong Hup is one of the largest integrated poultry, egg and livestock feed producers in Southeast Asia, with businesses in five countries in the region.
Its executive director and group CEO Tan Sri Francis Lau said the group successfully raised total gross proceeds of RM275 million from the public issue of 250 million new shares based on the IPO price of RM1.10 per share.
The proceeds will be utilised mainly for its business and operational facilities expansion, which include capital expenditure to facilitate the expansion of its operations in Malaysia, Vietnam and the Philippines as well as for working capital.
A total of 10 cornerstone investors took up the almost entire offering for the institutional investors (excluding the MITI tranche) amounting to about RM462 million, while its retail tranche of 73 million new shares reserved for the Malaysian public was oversubscribed by 3.64 times.
Leong Hup’s net profit for the first quarter ended March 31, 2019 rose 15% to RM60.58 million from RM52.68 million a year ago driven by higher sales of eggs, broiler day old chicks and feedmill.
