Del Monte seeks to raise up to $333m via IPO

Del Monte Philippines Inc, the wholly-owned Philippine subsidiary of global branded food and beverage firm Del Monte Pacific Limited, has received approval from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to raise up to P17.55 billion (about $333 million) via an initial public offering (IPO).

This would mark the second IPO in the Philippines so far this year following the approval by the SEC of the IPO application of construction and property developer DM Wenceslao early this month. The Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) is still optimistic of having eight IPOs in the entire year.

In a statement released on Thursday, the SEC said it has approved Del Monte’s IPO, which involves 587.437 million secondary shares to be sold at P29.88 ($0.57) per share. This represents 21 per cent of the firm’s outstanding capital stock.

“The company will not directly receive any net proceeds from the offer… no amount of the proceeds will be used to reimburse any officer, director, employee for services rendered, assets previously transferred, money loaned or advanced, or otherwise,” the country’s corporate regulator said.

Del Monte Pacific earlier said it intends to use the proceeds from the offer to partially prepay or repay certain loan facilities.

“The balance of proceeds, if any, will be used for general corporate purposes. The prepayment of such loans will allow the Del Monte Pacific Limited Group to deleverage and strengthen its balance sheet,” Del Monte Pacific said.

According to the SEC document, about 70 per cent of the offer shares is earmarked to be sold to domestic investors, while the remaining 30 per cent will be sold to foreign institutional and retail investors.

Del Monte Philippines is engaged in the production and sale of food and beverage products – such as fruit juices and juice drinks, packaged pineapple and mixed fruit, various tomato, spaghetti sauces and culinary mixes – in the Philippines under the Del Monte brand and exports these products under the S&W brand.

It also operates one of the world’s largest fully-integrated pineapple operations and has been growing and processing pineapple for over 90 years.

The PSE expressed confidence that at least eight IPOs will be conducted this year even as only two firms have filed IPO applications with the SEC so far – Del Monte and DM Wenceslao.

The PSE posted a net income of Php825 million ($16 million) for the full-year 2017, an increase of 18 per cent from the Php702 million it generated in 2016, according to the unaudited consolidated financial statement posted on its website.