AMSTERDAM: GrandVision BV, the Dutch company that operates 33 chains of optician stores around the world, raised 1.02 billion euros ($1.17 billion) in the second initial public offering this week on Amsterdam’s stock exchange.
Majority owner HAL Holding NV sold 51 million shares at 20 euros apiece — about 20 percent of the total, prior to the exercise of an over-allotment option — giving GrandVision a market value of 5 billion euros, the Curacao- and Monaco-based investment firm said in a statement. The shares rose slightly from the IPO price when trading commenced in Amsterdam.
HAL Holding, a subsidiary of publicly traded HAL Trust, is capitalizing on favorable market conditions, with the STOXX Europe 600 Retail Index of the region’s main retail stocks having just come off the highest level since 2007. Retail companies raised about $8.5 billion in IPOs last year, the most in more than a decade, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
GrandVision’s listing will help support expansion, according to Chief Executive Officer Theo Kiesselbach. Sales have increased more than 50-fold since the company’s creation in 1996, with part of that growth generated from making acquisitions almost every year.
