The initial share sale of Antony Waste Handling Cell Ltd, India’s first waste management services company to go public, was subscribed almost two times on the first day of the issue on Monday thanks mainly to demand from retail individual investors.
The offering of about 6.67 million shares, excluding the anchor investors' portion, received bids for over 13.2 million shares, stock-exchange data showed.
Retail investors bid for 3.5 times the quota reserved for them. High-net-worth investors and corporate houses bid for 7.3% of the shares set aside for them. Institutional investors bid for 63% of their quota.
Ahead of the IPO, Antony Waste raised Rs 90 crore from anchor investors including Massachusetts Institute of Technology, SBI Mutual Fund and Tata AIG General Insurance Company by allotting 2.86 million shares at the upper end of its price of Rs 313-315 each. The IPO closes Wednesday.
This is the second time that Antony Waste has attempted an IPO, after failing to go public in March this year as stock markets turned volatile in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.
Antony Waste had originally filed its draft prospectus in January 2019. It refiled for the IPO last month. The Securities and Exchange Board of India issued final observations to Antony Waste’s proposal on November 13.
The size of the revised IPO is smaller than the original proposal. The firm is looking to raise Rs 85 crore in the revised issue as against Rs 98.5 crore it planned earlier.
Its financial backer, activist hedge fund Elliott Management, has also reduced the number of shares up for sale. While Elliott intended to sell three-fourths of its 48% stake in Antony Waste, it is now offloading just about half. The hedge fund had originally backed Antony Waste in 2007.
Elliott is a New York-based multi-billion dollar investment management and hedge fund. It is also the world’s largest activist fund in terms of assets under management and is controlled by Paul Singer. Activist hedge funds are typically geared towards unlocking shareholder value.
Antony Waste is eyeing a valuation of around Rs 890 crore in IPO, about 11% more than what it was aiming for in March this year.
Antony Waste has added IIFL Holding to the syndicate of merchant bankers arranging the share sale. Earlier, Equirus Capital was the sole merchant banker mandated to arrange the share sale.
Incorporated in January 2001, Antony Waste offers solid waste collection, transportation, and processing and disposal services. It primarily undertakes municipal solid waste (MSW) cleaning and transportation projects, MSW processing projects and mechanised sweeping projects directly or through its subsidiaries.
Antony Waste plans to use Rs 40 crore to part-finance a waste-to-energy plant for Pimpri Chinchwad Municipal Corporation. The project is being undertaken by group entity Antony Lara Renewable Energy Pvt. Ltd.
The company has also proposed to use 38.5 crore from the fresh net proceeds to reduce its outstanding debt besides using a certain amount towards general corporate purposes.