D-day At Last

Kenya's largest mobile telecommunications network service provider, Safaricom, will launch its initial public offer March 28 and closes on April 23 taking a total of 26 days. This offer for sale will give Kenyans amble opportunity to invest.



Stakes

The government will offer 25% of the issued ordinary shares of Safaricom. The IPO will offer 10 billion shares priced at 5 Kenyan shillings a share, which implies a value of KES200 billion ($3 billion).



High Expectations

Thw Governement hopes to raise KES50 billion from the IPO, which will be used to finance development programs and hopefully to supplement the budgetary deficit that had been witnessed in the FY 206/07.





Pools

The offer will be split into two pools - domestic and international. The international pool will be open to institutional investors only. The price will be determined through a book-building.

Investors in the domestic pool will have to buy a minimum of 2,000 shares. This means that any Kenyan intending to invest (and i know many including mama mbogas) are keen to have a stak of this 'sexy pie' and probably make a kill when it comes for trading in may.



Market Share

Safaricom's estimated market share at the end of December was 80%. The company has nearly 10 million subscribers.



Advisors

Morgan Stanley and with local investment bank, Dyer & Blair are the transaction advisors alongside other banks as citibank.



Official IPO site

The official IPO site is here