This IPO Could Be The Largest Oil Firm Listing In A Decade

Spain’s energy company Compañia Española de Petróleos (Cepsa) said on Monday that it plans to list 25 percent of its shares on Spanish stock exchanges in an initial public offering (IPO) in the fourth quarter, which sources and analyst expect to be one of the largest, if not the largest, oil listing in the past decade.

Cepsa’s IPO is expected to raise around US$3.5 billion (3 billion euro), according to Bloomberg sources and data, which would value the whole company at around US$11.6 billion (10 billion euro).

Abu Dhabi’s sovereign fund Mubadala Investment Company currently owns 100 percent after an Abu Dhabi entity, IPIC, bought the Spanish company in 2011. IPIC later merged with Mubadala Development Company under a common parent company, Mubadala Investment Company. Back in 2011, when the Abu Dhabi fund bought from Total the shares in Cepsa it didn’t already own, the deal was for US$4.3 billion (3.7 billion euro) for 48.83 percent in Cepsa, valuing the entire company at some US$8.7 billion (7.5 billion euro).

Cepsa’s IPO will consist of a fully secondary offering of a limited number of shares by the company’s sole shareholder to international qualified institutional investors as well as to certain employees of the Company and its Spanish subsidiaries, the Spanish company said in today’s statement, noting that the approval process by the Spanish stock market regulator is ongoing. The press release made no mention of a price range for the IPO or total company value.

Cepsa said it plans to apply for admission to listing of its shares on the Madrid, Barcelona, Bilbao, and Valencia stock exchanges.

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Cepsa is the fourth largest industrial company by revenue in Spain and operates three refineries in Spain accounting for 40 percent of the country’s refining capacity, according to Mubadala.

As of August 2018, Cepsa’s refining facilities in Spain had a total capacity of around 483,000 bpd, the company said in its release announcing the intention to list shares.

Cepsa also has upstream operations in Abu Dhabi, Algeria, Colombia, Peru, Thailand, Malaysia, and Spain across 27 blocks in the exploration, development, or production phases.

By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

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