The partial privatisation of Austrian Post with the flotation of a 49% holding was successfullycompleted today following strong demand for shares during the subscription period over the last
fortnight. The IPO, which makes the Austrian postal operator into Europe’s third listed postoffice, raised just over €650 million.The IPO emission price was fixed at €19 per share, giving Austrian Post a market capitalizationof €1.33 billion. After opening at €20.90, the share rose to €21.08 by midday on the Vienna stockexchange.
The offering of 31,500,000 shares in the company (excluding the over-allotment option) wasapproximately eight times over-subscribed due to very strong domestic and international demand,Austrian Post said in a statement. Including the over-allotment option, a total of 34,300,000shares or 49.0% of the share capital will have been sold.
About one third of shares were sold to Austrian-based investors. A total of 13,361 postalemployees (51% of entitled staff) bought shares, meaning that about 5.4% of the floated shares arenow owned by staff.
The Austrian state holding company ÖIAG will receive all proceeds from the sale of the shares. Aproportion will be re-invested in Austrian Post in order to finance its planned regional expansionand launch of new services.
