BrokerDealer Fantex Completes IPO for NFL Star EJ Manuel

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Buffalo Bills Star E.J.Manuel

Buffalo Bills Star E.J.Manuel

Sports-centric brokerdealer Fantex announced it raised enough capital to close 523,700 shares of Buffalo Bills quarterback EJ Manuel and shares of his convertible tracking stock. The IPO required help from the company which stepped up to buy 250,000 shares, or 48 percent of its own shares of the total offered amount.

Trading under the Fantex ticker EJMLL, the stock began trading last week at Fantex.com. This is the second successful athlete IPO that Fantex has been able to close. CEO Buck French voiced his excitement on the success of the program and future plans to build E.J. Manuel’s NFL Brand.

Fantex, a sports marketing stock exchange, allows traders to capture a share of contracted athletes’ career earnings potential. On its exchange, Fantex offered 523,700 shares of stock at $10 per share on Manuel. In return, Fantex will pay Manuel almost $5 million up front to receive 10% of his future earnings tied to his “brand.” These future earnings include any NFL contracts, marketing endorsements, post-career broadcasting contracts, and any other checks he’ll cash through his NFL “brand.”

A full exploration of the firm’s operations, business model and potential risks to investors is the subject of a feature story in the print debut of The Alpha Pages

Fidelity Investments Partners With BrokerDealer Credit Suisse for IPO Deal Flow

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Fidelity Investments and investment banker/brokerdealer Credit Suisse have formed a partnership that gives Fidelity’s retail brokerage clients access to participate in initial public offerings and follow-on equity offering underwritten by Credit Suisse. The partnership opens up IPO investing for customers of Fidelity’s registered investment advisor (RIA) network, its family office clients and its retail brokerage customers who qualify.

For Credit Suisse, the arrangement opens up its potential investor base to a wide arena of new customers. “It gives us the ability to distribute shares into the mass market that we didn’t have before,” David Hermer, Credit Suisse’s head of equity capital markets for the Americas, told New York Times DealBook.

About 232 companies have gone public so far this year, nearly 79 percent more compared with those in the period a year earlier, according to data from Renaissance Capital. By Mr. Hermer’s reckoning, the I.P.O. surge is still only in its early stages.

Credit Suisse completed 63 book-run IPOs in the first half of 2014, its most active half-year period on record. For that period, Credit Suisse ranks number two for IPOs in the U.S. and in the EMEA area–Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Looking ahead, Credit Suisse is working on several high-profile deals, including the much-anticipated IPO for Chinese internet company Alibaba.

And, the thinking goes, the more companies that Credit Suisse helps take public, the more that Fidelity customers benefit. The IPO participation is open to Fidelity investors with a minimum of $500,000 in retail assets.

British Roadside Assistance Company AA Raises $2.36 Billion in I.P.O.

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BrokerDealer.com/blog update courtesy of extracts from today’s NYT DealBook

LONDON – The AA, the British roadside assistance provider, raised 1.39 billion pounds, or about $2.36 billion, in its initial public offering in London on Monday.

The AA priced its offering of 554 million shares at £2.50 a share, a price it had announced earlier this month, giving it a market capitalization of £1.39 billion.

Shares of the AA declined 4 percent to £2.39 in conditional trading in London on Monday morning. Unrestricted trading of the AA’s shares is expected to begin on Thursday.

The offering represents the final dismantling of Acromas, which was created in 2007 by the merger of the AA and Saga, a seller of travel and insurance packages focusing on people older than 50.

Saga was spun off in an initial public offering in May. Saga’s stock has traded below its offer price in recent weeks.

Acromas, which is owned by the private equity firms CVC Capital Partners, Charterhouse Capital Partners and Permira, had been expected to retain a 31 percent stake in the AA after the spinoff, but agreed to sell its entire stake in the offering, which was oversubscribed.

Separately, River and Mercantile Group, a British investment manager, raised about £41.5 million in its initial public offering on Monday. The company priced its public offering at £1.83 a share, giving it a market capitalization of about £150.2 million.

The company, which did not provide an expected share price range when it announced in May its plans to go public, was formed in February by the merger of River and Mercantile Asset Management and P-Solve, a fellow investment manager.

Through June 16, 55 London I.P.O.s have raised £9.4 billion, compared with £2.5 billion during the same period in 2013, according to Thomson Reuters.

The AA, founded in 1905 as the Automobile Association, is Britain’s largest provider of breakdown assistance, with about a 40 percent share of the roadside help market. About 16 million drivers subscribe to the AA’s products.

Its roadside assistance packages start around £95 a year for the first year of coverage. The company also provides breakdown coverage for businesses, as well as a variety of home, travel and other insurance products.

The full article can be found at NYT DealBook.

British Property Website Zoopla Valued at $1.5 Billion in I.P.O

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BrokerDealer.com/blog update courtesy of extracts from today’s NYT DealBook

LONDON – Zoopla Property Group, a British real estate listings website, was valued at more than $1.5 billion in its initial public offering in London on Wednesday.

The company priced its offering at 2.20 pounds a share — just below the midpoint of its initial price range of £2 to £2.50 a share — giving it a market capitalization of £918.8 million, or about $1.56 billion.

The offering came amid increasing worries about Britain’s red-hot housing market. The country’s top financial officials have warned recently of the need for new lending rules to curb the risks the frothy market poses to economic growth and falling unemployment.

Bruce Dear, head of London real estate at ​the ​law firm Eversheds, ​said the Zoopla I.P.O. “has been caught marginally offside by the Bank of England flagging that the housing market must be dampened. ​ This explains their sensible ‘lower half’ pricing.

“How Zoopla must wish it had made its I.P.O. run three months ago,” Mr. Dear said.

Zoopla’s shares rose more than 5 percent in early trading on Wednesday.

Started in 2008, the website attracts more than 20 million visits a month. About 19,000 real estate agents in Britain pay a monthly subscription fee to advertise their listings on the site, generating the vast majority of Zoopla’s revenue.

In announcing its I.P.O. last month, Zoopla said it had strong market penetration levels, representing about 90 percent of residential listings from property professionals in Britain.

“Today’s announcement marks an important milestone for our business following a number of years of strong growth and having built a market-leading proposition,” Alex Chesterman, Zoopla’s founder and chief executive, said at the time.

If an over-allotment of shares is fully exercised, Zoopla expects to realize proceeds of £369.9 million, or about $627.6 million. The public float, excluding any over-allotment, represented 38.3 percent of Zoopla’s share capital.

Daily Mail and General Trust, which is the publisher of The Daily Mail newspaper and its popular website, reduced its holdings in Zoopla through the offering, retaining a 33.7 percent stake before the exercise of the additional share allotment.

The full article can be found at NYT DealBook.

Swedish Cable Company Com Hem Raises $853 Million in Initial Public Offering.

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BrokerDealer.com/blog update courtesy of extracts from today’s NYT DealBook

LONDON – The Swedish cable company Com Hem Holding said on Tuesday that it raised 5.67 billion Swedish kronor, or about $853 million, in its initial public offering on the Nasdaq OMXStockholm exchange.

Com Hem, which was acquired by the private equity firm BC Partners in 2011, priced its offering at 58 kronor a share, giving it a market capitalization of 11.5 billion kronor. Shares of Com Hem rose 8.8 percent, to 63.10 kronor, in trading in Stockholm on Tuesday morning.

Com Hem is the largest cable company in Sweden, with around 1.8 million connected households. It could receive additional proceeds of up to 567 million kronor if an overallotment of shares in the offering is fully exercised.

BC Partners, which did not sell shares in the I.P.O., remains the company’s largest investor, with a 50 percent stake. It would hold a 47.7 percent stake if the additional allotment were sold.

“With the support of our new shareholders, we are in a strong position to move forward and to grow our business,” Anders Nilsson, the Com Hem chief executive, said.

Com Hem plans to use the proceeds to reduce debt and to give it more financial flexibility.

The I.P.O. comes at a time of consolidation in Europe’s telecommunications industry.

Vodafone of Britain, Telefónica of Spain and other large players have announced acquisitions in the last 18 months as Europe’s largest carriers bolster their offerings by purchasing cable and fixed-line assets to complement their mobile networks.

Com Hem, founded in 1983, also provides broadband and telephone services. It was spun out of Sweden’s former telecommunications monopoly and counts 39 percent of all households in the country as customers.

The company posted net revenue of 4.4 billion Swedish kronor in fiscal year 2013 and employs about 950 people.

The full article can be found at NYT DealBook.