Wilmar unit YKA's IPO shares to start trading on Shenzhen bourse on Oct 15

WILMAR International on Wednesday announced that some 542.2 million new shares of Yihai Kerry Arawana Holdings (YKA) have been allotted to investors pursuant to the Chinese company's initial public offering (IPO).

These shares comprised 10 per cent of YKA's enlarged issued share capital.

They will commence trading on the ChiNext board of the Shenzhen Stock Exchange on Thursday.

With the IPO shares allotted, YKA has become an 89.99 per cent-owned subsidiary of Wilmar, the mainboard-listed agri-food giant said in a bourse filing.

YKA is a wholesaler and distributor of food products such as small package edible oil, rice and flour. The company is also involved in industry processes such as oilseed crushing and edible oil refining.

The long-awaited listing of Wilmar's Chinese unit had raised about 13.93 billion yuan (S$2.81 billion) after the close of applications late last month. Proceeds will go towards partially funding 19 investment projects.

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The IPO shares were heavily oversubscribed - by 600.5 times for offline investors, raising 5.82 billion yuan, and by about 1,750 times for online retail investors, raising 3.9 billion yuan.

Strategic investors accounted for 4.18 billion yuan, or 30 per cent of the IPO shares. Singapore sovereign wealth fund GIC was among the strategic investors.

Wilmar shares finished flat at S$4.65 on Tuesday.

On Sept 24, the counter had seen heavy trading after Wilmar announced the IPO issue price of 25.7 yuan per share.