European blocks and IPOs stumble

摘要

European ECM is once again on thin ice after German online car seller MEINAUTO pulled its IPO at the last moment and was followed by a dogs dinner of a debut from Canadian chip designer ALPHAWAVE IP CROUP that has imperilled the new issue pipeline. The challenge to ECM issuance was apparent earlier in the week when Monday night saw seven overnight trades launched to raise US$4.4bn, including the first market sale in nearly three years by the UK government of a part of its majority stake in NATWEST. The following day five of those delivered losses to investors, led by the 13.8% slump in EVOLUTION GAMING on the back of a SKr6.3bn (US$756m)ABB. The difficulty followed US markets trading off on Monday, led by tech names (Tesla dropped 6.4%), that filtered through into Asia and Europe on Tuesday. The prospects had looked good for both MeinAuto and Alphawave until then. MeinAuto was covered on its first day of bookbuilding on May 5 though final guidance on Tuesday morning was that pricing would come at the bottom of the €16-€20 range. By the afternoon the €326m Frankfurt float was scrapped. Alphawave's £857m London Stock Exchange IPO had a similarly auspicious start, achieving coverage within hours of opening bookbuilding and guiding investors to pricing of 410p on Wednesday morning, the upper half of the 375p-130p price range.