Airtel Mobile Commerce NV set the price of its London initial public offering (IPO) at £1.96 a share, valuing the African payments business at about £5.3 billion, or $7 billion, as parent Airtel Africa moves to establish Airtel Money as a separately listed company.
Existing investors are expected to sell 270 million shares, which would raise about £529.2 million before any over-allotment. A further 27 million shares may be sold under the over-allotment option, potentially increasing the total secondary sale to £582.1 million.
Airtel Africa is not expected to sell shares in the base offering and plans to remain a long-term strategic shareholder.
The transaction is a sale of existing stock, meaning Airtel Money itself will not receive proceeds from the base IPO. The listing is instead designed to create an independently traded valuation for the mobile-money platform, broaden public ownership and give existing shareholders a route to partial liquidity.
The International Finance Corp. has committed to buy up to £67.2 million, or about $90 million, of shares from selling holders at the offer price. At £1.96, that commitment represents about 34.3 million shares, or roughly 12.7% of the base deal.
Airtel Africa Retains Control
Airtel Africa’s decision not to sell stock in the base offer is central to the transaction. The telecom group is signaling that it wants Airtel Money to develop as an independent listed business while retaining strategic exposure to its future expansion.
The base offering would place about 16.5% of Airtel Money’s ordinary shares in public hands.
That could increase to about 17.5% if the over-allotment option is fully exercised. Airtel Money said the expected free float should make the shares eligible for inclusion in FTSE UK indexes, although eligibility is not equivalent to automatic inclusion or a guarantee of index-fund demand.
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