Last month, Believe Digital announced that it was planning a more than $600 million (€500 million) listing on the Paris Stock Exchange. Now, the indie label distribution company has lowered its IPO ambitions to €300 million – a full 40 percent less than the initially outlined figure.
Believe disclosed the decidedly smaller raise target – as well as a number of other details about its IPO – today, via a formal release. It bears mentioning at the outset that the Paris-headquartered business, which launched a revamped website one week back, originally intended to raise €2 billion ($2.45 billion at the present exchange rate) from the IPO, according to November of 2020 reports.
Higher-ups then reduced the figure to €500 million/$612.19 million last month, as noted, and to €300 million/$367.28 million today. However, the sum could increase to as much as €330 million/$404.01 million, owing to an “over-allotment option” that Believe has in place. Said option would up the new shares (15,384,616, at the low-end price point) – and, in turn, the generated capital – by a maximum of 10 percent.
Regarding Believe’s per-share value out of the gate, the company has set an “indicative price range” of €19.50 ($23.86) to €22.50 ($27.53). Additionally, the French public offering kicked off today and is scheduled to wrap next Tuesday, June 8th, with shares becoming available via the Euronext Paris on Thursday the 10th.
Finally, in terms of the approximately $367 million IPO, Believe expects to put 30 percent of the listing’s funds (€90 million) towards paying off existing debt, and the 16-year-old entity also disclosed that it secured a new credit facility in the amount of €170 million ($208.03 million) from a collection of international banks about one month ago.
In other IPO news, French conglomerate Vivendi is preparing to take Universal Music Group public on the Euronext Amsterdam on Monday, September 27th “at the latest.” And ahead of the Big Three record label’s long-awaited public-market arrival – which will follow Warner Music’s own stock-market return – Vivendi is considering selling another 10 percent UMG stake (on top of the 20 percent interest that Tencent acquired for €6 billion) to an unidentified American investor.
Furthermore, tech company (and Tencent competitor) NetEase just recently revealed plans to spin off its streaming music service, NetEase Cloud Music, in a reportedly $1 billion Hong Kong IPO. The 24-year-old business said that it will announce further details about the listing – which specifically covers Cloud Village, the division that develops and operates NetEase Cloud Music – “when appropriate.”
Lastly, Hybe Corporation, the company behind K-pop mainstay BTS, has quietly achieved more than 66 percent stock-price growth since the start of 2021, following an ultra-successful IPO in September of 2020.