MST Business | Nov. 07, 2014 at 11:01pm
listed its shares with the Philippine Stock Exchange on
Friday, when it rose 6.5 percent to P7.99. Shown
during the bell-ringing ceremony to mark the
company’s listing at the PSE Plaza in Makati City are
(from left) SSI Group president Anton Huang,
chairman and chief executive Zenaida Tantoco,
Rustan’s founder Bienvenido Tantoco Sr., SSI
director Donnie Tantoco, PSE chairman Jose Pardo
and PSE chief operating officer Roel Refran. LINO
SANTOS
Shares of SSI Group Inc., a specialty retailer controlled by the Tantoco family, rose 6.5 percent to close at P7.99 Friday from the initial public offering price of P7.50.
Around 26,296,900 shares were traded during SSI’s market debut Friday valued at P210.278 million.
SSI shares traded at a high of P8.02 apiece but closed at P7.99 at the end of the trading day period.
SSI raised around P5 billion from the listing at the Philippine Stock Exchange. The company said it would use the proceeds to expand its specialty retail businesses, infuse additionalinvestments in the Family Mart convenience store chain and Wellworth department stores and to retire some debt.
SSI Group president Anton Huang told reporters following the listing ceremony the company was bullish over the prospects next year due to a stronger consumer-led economy fueled the expanding upper market and middle-income segment.
“I think we’re in great times, because at this point the upper segment continues to grow. It has always been quite solid, resilient, especially now that the economy is extremely well,” Huang said.
“At the same time, we are at this point that our middle-income segment is also growing as well, so we’re able to tap both,” he said.
SSI, which resells 103 international brands in the Philippines and operates convenience stores through the FamilyMart chain, earlier said orders from foreign institutional buyers exceeded the shares offered by several times while domestic takeup was also robust.
SSI set its IPO price at P7.50, at the top end of its P7 to P7.50 indicative range.
