Solar Philippines unit sets IPO price at P1 per share
Solar Philippines Nueva Ecija Corp. (SPNEC), the first company to debut on the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) under the renewable energy (RE) listing framework and the first solar pure-play to come to the market, priced its initial public offering (IPO) at P1 per share.
This pegged at P2.7 billion the offering size of SPNEC, which is led by 28-year-old Leandro Antonio Leviste, the youngest business founder to bring a company public in recent local bourse history.
The IPO had been priced at the maximum indicative price as the institutional tranche was “oversubscribed” as of Wednesday, with “more orders still coming in,” said a market source privy to the equity deal.
SPNEC is developing a 500-megawatt solar farm in Nueva Ecija, touted as the largest in Southeast Asia, with leasing rights covering 352.42 hectares of former pasture land. With a potential to scale up to 1.2 gigawatts and expand its geographical footprint in the future, it could even be one of the largest in the world, if things go as planned.
“It is a pure-play on renewable energy. This is the future and this is where energy growth will be. SPNEC will eventually ride on ESG (environmental, social and governance) investing as investors are eyeing this aspect when deploying funds,” said Manny Cruz, chief strategist at local stock brokerage Papa Securities.
This equity deal will give SPNEC a post-IPO market capitalization of P8.1 billion.
The PSE’s listing framework allows any RE firm without any operating history to launch an IPO as long as it complies with requirements, including having a valid and subsisting service contract awarded by the Department of Energy.
“We are thankful for this opportunity to launch the Solar Philippines group’s first public offering, which we see as a favorable signal for future offerings,” Leviste said on Wednesday, after the IPO pricing was announced.
SPNEC seeks to capture growing investor interest on renewable energy, with the sustainability agenda an imperative for humanity amid an existential threat coming from climate change.
