Foreign Investors Secure Majority Shares in Aramco
Aramco had set a price range for its shares between $7.12 and $7.73 but said on Friday it ended up pricing them at $7.27.
Foreign investors have secured over half of an $11.2 billion share sale in Aramco, two anonymous sources told Reuters.[1]
This comes at a time when the kingdom is keen on directing international capital into its projects to reduce reliance on oil.
"There were multiple orders from the US, UK, Hong Kong and Japan," one of the sources said.
The demand for Aramco's second offering, codenamed Project Bond by the banks involved, exceeded the initial public offering (IPO) of Aramco earlier this year.
Shares were priced at $7. 27 per share.
"The overall demand for the offering was greater than $65 billion across global blue-chip institutions and the domestic retail offering," he said.
Aramco's second offering will help the oil giant gain access to more than 120 international investors, making it well-connected all over the world.
Moelis & Co. and M. Klein & Co. acted as independent financial advisers.
The lead manager was SNB Capital. It also acted as a joint global coordinator along with Citigroup Inc., Goldman Sachs Group Inc., HSBC Holdings Plc, JPMorgan Chase & Co., Bank of America Corp., and Morgan Stanley.
Al Rajhi Capital, BOC International, BNP Paribas SA, China International Capital Corp., EFG Hermes, Riyad Capital, Saudi Fransi Capital, and UBS were the bookrunners.
During Aramco's 2019 IPO, global investors mainly balked at valuation estimates, leaving the government reliant on domestic buyers. The $29.4 billion IPO received $106 billion in orders, with international purchasers receiving approximately 23% of the shares.
In May, Saudi Arabia announced that it was planning a multi-billion-dollar share sale in the energy giant Aramco.
