Korea/Asia, Events, IPOs, Douglas Research Advisory

Douglas Kim

Nearly 30 years of experience in the Korean/Asian equity research. Major sectors coverage include the following:
- Technology 
- Consumer 
- Special Situations/Deep Value Plays
- Tender Offers/M&As
- Holdcos/Stubs
- Asian Unicorns/Private Companies

Korea/Asia, Events, IPOs

K Car Listing: Final Allocation, Lockup Schedule, & Immediate Float

K Car's Share Price Roars Higher Driven by a Greater Demand for Online Purchase of Used Vehicles

Alpha Generation Through High Dividend Stocks in Korea

New Exclusive Partnership With Carvana. A Turnaround Story?

Equity Capital Markets

<h2>Bookbuilding Results of K Car IPO</h2><p><a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/k-car" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:34118:1" rel="noopener">K Car (381970 KS)</a> announced today that the <a href="https://www.newsis.com/view/?id=NISX20210929_0001597864&amp;cID=15001&amp;pID=15000" target="_blank" rel="noopener">IPO price</a> has been determined at 25,000 won, which was below the IPO price range of 34,300 won and 43,200 won. There were mixed responses from the overseas and domestic institutional investors. Most of the global institutional investors, that have recorded high returns from IPOs of global used car trading online platform companies such as Carvana and Vroom in the US, applied at the upper end of the IPO offering price and showed solid demand. </p><p>On the other hand, the domestic institutional investors were more conservative in their view of this IPO, especially after the recent sluggish performance of major IPOs in Korea including <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/krafton-inc" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:28956:1" rel="noopener"> Krafton Inc (259960 KS)</a> and <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/lotte-rental-co-ltd" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:33445:1" rel="noopener">Lotte Rental (089860 KS)</a>. Plus, given the recent series of large scale IPOs in Korea, many local institutions have limited amount of funds for further investments in IPOs.  </p><div class="content-highlight">
<p>We continue to have a positive view of the K Car IPO following the bookbuilding results. However, it appears that the market (especially local investors) have taken a much more pessimistic view of this IPO especially due to the recent poor IPO of Lotte Rental combined with the threat of Hyundai Motor Group becoming a major competitor.</p>
<p>We have lowered our fair value assessment to 38,809 per share, which still represents an upside of 55% versus the IPO price of 25,000 won. Our fair value assessment is based on 0.9x P/S using our estimated sales of 2.3 trillion won for the company in 2022. While we maintained our earnings estimates, we lowered to target multiple by 30% in 2022. The 0.9x P/S multiple now reflects a 30% discount to the comps' multiples (which are mainly US based companies). </p>
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Bookbuilding Results of K Car IPOK Car (381970 KS) announced today that the IPO price has been determined at 25,000 won, which was below the IPO price range of 34,300 won and 43,200 won. There were mixed responses from the overseas and domestic institutional investors. Most of the global institutional investors, that have recorded high returns from IPOs of global used car trading online platform companies such as Carvana and Vroom in the US, applied at the upper end of the IPO offering price and showed solid demand. On the other hand, the domestic institutional investors were more conservative in their view of this IPO, especially after the recent sluggish performance of major IPOs in Korea including  Krafton Inc (259960 KS) and Lotte Rental (089860 KS). Plus, given the recent series of large scale IPOs in Korea, many local institutions have limited amount of funds for further investments in IPOs.  
We continue to have a positive view of the K Car IPO following the bookbuilding results. However, it appears that the market (especially local investors) have taken a much more pessimistic view of this IPO especially due to the recent poor IPO of Lotte Rental combined with the threat of Hyundai Motor Group becoming a major competitor.
We have lowered our fair value assessment to 38,809 per share, which still represents an upside of 55% versus the IPO price of 25,000 won. Our fair value assessment is based on 0.9x P/S using our estimated sales of 2.3 trillion won for the company in 2022. While we maintained our earnings estimates, we lowered to target multiple by 30% in 2022. The 0.9x P/S multiple now reflects a 30% discount to the comps' multiples (which are mainly US based companies). 


K Car

K-Car IPO Bookbuilding Results Analysis