Anna Jiwon Park has been covering the politics at The Korea Times since the summer of 2024, when she joined the press pool for the Office of the President in Korea. Prior to that, she spent about five years reporting extensively on financial markets, regulatory authorities and the financial industry. She joined The Korea Times in 2019 after spending eight years as a broadcast journalist at Arirang TV, Korea’s leading global broadcaster, covering politics, defense and culture.
Will IPO market recover?
A promotional image of Oasis / Courtesy of Oasis
By Anna J. Park
Lucrative e-commerce platform Oasis drops IPO plan
By Anna J. Park
Grocery e-commerce platform Oasis has become the latest Korean company that decided to cancel its initial public offering plans amid unfavorable market conditions since last year.
Kurly, a premium grocery e-commerce, ended up dropping its IPO plan in early January, due mainly to a plunging corporate valuation.
But, the firm had to give up its plan to list itself on the tech-heavy Kosdaq market, as it announced early this week that it will not seek to go public.
“With uncertainties and slowdowns in both internal and external market conditions negatively influencing investment sentiments, Oasis' corporate valuation cannot be appropriately assessed,” an official from Oasis said. “As the sole e-commerce that makes annual profits, we do not find it necessary to push forward the IPO plan,” the official added.
During its book-building process conducted in early February, institutional investors thought the company's market-cap of some one trillion won ($780 million) and offering price was too expensive, with too much of existing shares' sales included in the initial offering. Existing shares constitute 30 percent of the entire number of initial offerings planned during the IPO.
Market experts say the unfavorable market conditions surrounding large market cap IPOs will continue for the time being. This year alone, Kurly, K bank, and Hyundai Samho Heavy Industries, among others, have decided to scrap their IPO plans. Last year, over 13 companies, including Hyundai Engineering, SK Shieldus and CJ Olive Young, canceled their IPO plans.
But some market analysts remain positive that the IPO market will heat up later this year, as macroeconomic indices are expected to improve during the second half of this year.
“As large market cap companies are more susceptible to market conditions, some of the major candidates of IPO were more negatively influenced by the external situations,” Choi Jong-kyung, an analyst at Heungkuk Securities, said. “It is likely that these large-cap companies will seek to go public during the second half of this year.”