Ferretti to Raise €265m from IPO on Milan Exchange
By David Robinson
Shares to start trading on June 27 at €3.00 per share.
The IPO planned by Italy’s Ferretti SpA group on the Euronext Milan stock exchange has now been completed with trading of the shares starting on June 27 at an initial price of €3.00 per share. The gross proceeds raised will be approximately €265m and the shares will be dual listed with that on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.
The Milan IPO listing on the Euronext Milan exchange, managed by Borsa Italiana SpA, has now been successfully concluded and the gross proceeds from the offering will be payable to the selling shareholder.
The offering has attracted broad interest among leading Italian and international institutional investors with approximately 70 lines allocated, which will result in a widened and strengthened institutional shareholder base of the company.
Two Anchor investors, Danilo Lervolino and Karel Komarek, have been allocated in total 35.4% of the offer shares equal to about 10% of the company’s share capital. Based on the offer price, the company’s market capitalization as of the first day of trading on Euronext Milan will be equal to approximately €1bn.
The offering consists of 88,454,818 shares which have been sold by Ferretti International Holding SpA, the selling shareholder and the operating holding company for the Ferretti group, which was 63.75% owned by China’s state-owned Weichai group and 11% owned by Piero Ferrari, son of the luxury sports car company’s founder Enzo Ferrari.
Assuming no exercise of the Over-Allotment Option, the Offer Shares constitute approximately 26.1% of the share capital of the company.
The offer has been reserved exclusively for qualified investors in the Member States of the European Economic Area and the UK and to overseas institutional investors outside the USA, with the exception of those countries in which the offer is not permitted in the absence of authorizations from the competent authorities, in accordance with or exceptions related to applicable laws.
When the plan for the Milan listing was announced a note about Ferretti’s plans explained: “Although Asia remains strategic, as already communicated by the company, the listing would allow the company to broaden the composition of its shareholder base in some regions, such as Europe, the Middle East and the Americas, which represent the group’s main markets.”
The Ferretti Group operates shipyards in Forli, Ancona, Sarnico, La Spezia, Cattolica and Mondolfo in Italy, with a seventh being developed at Ravenna. Its brands include CRN, Custom Line, Ferretti Yachts, Itama, Pershing, Riva and Wally.
As to the two anchor shareholders participating in the offering:
• Danilo Lervolino is an Italian entrepreneur who founded online university UniPegaso in 2006, one of the first to be established in Italy. Lervolino started UniPegaso at age 28 and grew it to become the largest in Italy, serving more than 120,000 students. He sold his company Multiversity, which includes UniPegaso, to private equity firm CVC Capital Partners for $1.3bn in October 2021. Since selling UniPegaso, Lervolino has purchased Italian soccer team Salernitana and investigative magazine L’Espresso. He also invests in Italian tech start-ups, both independently and through a start-up accelerator and venture capital funds.
• Karel Komárek is a Czech businessman reportedly worth over $8bn as of February 2023. One of the Czech republic’s wealthiest citizens, he founded the KKCG group in 1995. KKCG’s business interests include energy, gaming, IT and real estate.