The initial public offering of Doosan Bobcat Inc., U.S.-based compact construction equipment maker owned by South Korea’s Doosan Infracore Co. drew less-than-expected interest despite scale-down in the volume and pricing as its presale came at a time the Seoul bourse was hit with bombshell whammy from domestic and U.S. political scene.

Doosan Bobcat drew only 1,713,020 bids for 6,005,636 shares offered to retail investors, selling just a third of the available issues, according its lead manager Korea Investment & Securities Co.

The tepid retail response deals as second embarrassment for the new main bourse entrant initially dubbed to be one of the biggest blockbuster IPOs in recent years. Due to poor demand, it had to push back the IPO from last month and significantly scale down the offering and price range. It lowered desired IPO price range to between 29,000 won ($25.25) and 33,000 won from between 41,000 won and 50,000 won and cut back the offering from previously planned 48,980,000 shares.

The shares were priced at 30,000 won apiece, helping Doosan Infracore raise 901 billion won from the IPO. The underscribed shares will have to be re-sold by the lead managers. The shares will be publicly traded from Nov. 18.

The Doosan Bobcat is another lackluster IPO after Samsung BioLogics, which also drew tepid response from retail investors. Samsung BioLogics shares that debuted on the Kospi market gained 5.88 percent from its IPO price of 136,000 won to end the day at 144,000 won as the main index recovered from the initial shock from Trump victory. The biopharmaceutical company commands market capitalization of 9.2 trillion won, standing as the 29th largest corporate entity based on market cap value.

By Song Gwang-sup

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