By Rama Venkat
BENGALURU (Reuters) -Shares of Manforce condom maker Mankind Pharma Ltd surged as much as 31% in debut trading on Tuesday, valuing the company at 566.43 billion rupees ($6.93 billion) in the country’s biggest listing so far this year.
The company, which also owns India’s top at-home pregnancy testing kit Prega News, opened at 1,300 rupees, staying above that mark through the morning session and hitting its highest at 1,414 rupees.
Mankind’s offer price was set at 1,080 rupees. It was seeking a valuation of 432.64 billion rupees ($5.29 billion) at the upper end of a price band it set for its initial public offering last month.
“The company has grown into the fourth-largest domestic pharmaceutical company by addressing affordability, accessibility and quality through lower pricing,” analysts at Macquarie Research said, initiating coverage of the stock with an “Outperform” rating.
Domestic listings peaked in 2021 with 183 firms, when the country saw high-profile IPOs of food delivery firm Zomato Ltd and digital payments company Paytm, data from Tracxn showed.
However, their stocks have fizzled out since, over concerns of valuations and profitability. Ongoing volatility in global markets have further made listings challenging.
“The IPO market has not been strong this year so far and that is because the overall equity market has been, with the sentiment by and large subdued,” said Hemang Jani, equity strategist at Motilal Oswal Financial Services.
Mankind could be the outlier that changes that, Jani added, saying the company “clearly stands out as after a long time a company with good business model and performance numbers is listing. The strong debut will likely lift the sentiment for the IPO market overall.”
The company’s IPO had an offer for sale of shares worth 43.26 billion rupees from existing shareholders, including its founder Ramesh Juneja, and allocated 12.98 billion rupees worth of shares to 77 anchor investors including Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, Government of Singapore, Goldman Sachs and Abu Dhabi Investment Authority.
($1 = 81.7800 Indian rupees)
(Reporting by Rama Venkat in Bengaluru; Editing by Nivedita Bhattacharjee)
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