HNA postpones Swissport sale, shelving second IPO in 2 weeks

Zurich

HNA Group Co is postponing a planned share sale in its aircraft ground-handling company Swissport Group, roughly two weeks after abandoning a similar plan for its Swiss airline caterer Gategroup Holding.

Swissport Group will defer the initial public offering (IPO) due to current market conditions, it said in a statement on Tuesday. The plan for a sale was announced in late January, before the recent surge in volatility.

IPOs have been unravelling since then as the wild market swings made conditions for a listing more difficult to predict. Gategroup, which was set to raise as much as 1.1 billion Swiss francs (S$1.5 billion), cancelled that sale 24 hours before trading was scheduled to start because it did not get the money it was seeking.

Also on Tuesday, HNA said it signed a preliminary agreement with Temasek Holdings, Singapore's investment firm, to cooperate in areas including aviation, logistics and airport infrastructure. The talks to team up come almost a year after Temasek sold its stake in Swiss duty-free store operator Dufry to HNA.

HNA is unwinding a global debt-fuelled acquisition spree as it seeks to trim one of the largest debt piles in corporate China. It plans to raise US$16 billion in the first half, a goal it may exceed after agreeing this month to divest all or part of its stake in Hilton Worldwide Holdings. BLOOMBERG