Nam Hyun-woo has worked as a staff writer at The Korea Times since 2013, mostly covering business and politics. He currently belongs to the Business Desk where he covers topics such as emerging tech, AI, ICT and Korea's chaebol community. Prior to joining the team, he was the paper's correspondent for the presidential office of Korea during the Yoon Suk Yeol and Moon Jae-in administrations.
SK hynix finishes filing for US depositary share offering
SK hynix's headquarters in Icheon, Gyeonggi Province / Yonhap
By Nam Hyun-woo
SK hynix has finished filing its registration statement for listing American Depositary Shares (ADS) on the Nasdaq market Tuesday (local time), after adding its litigation risks into the statement.
According to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the company completed its ADS listing process by filing the statement with the SEC.
The statement reflected a June 24 board decision to issue up to 17.79 million common shares, which is about 2.5 percent of its outstanding common shares, for the ADS listing.
The statement left blank both the offering price, volume and the number of ADSs representing one common share, but the company said in its board decision that it seeks to have 10 ADSs represent one common share, meaning the Nasdaq listing could raise up to $29.4 billion if the ADSs are priced in line with the company's current share price.
Compared to the previous version, the latest statement revised its Risk Factors section to add an antitrust class action lawsuit filed with the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California on June 25 by 14 U.S. consumers and three small PC manufacturers that indirectly purchased DRAM products.
The plaintiffs accused Samsung Electronics, SK hynix and Micron of price fixing to drive up memory chip prices, which in turn increased the costs of finished products such as iPads.
SK hynix plans to begin book building on July 6, set the final price on July 9 and start trading on Nasdaq on July 10. Since SK hynix is already a publicly traded company listed on Korea’s KOSPI, the listing took the form of American Depositary Receipts (ADRs), which represent underlying common shares held by a depositary bank.
SK hynix said it will use the proceeds for general corporate purposes and capital expenditures. Planned investments include new semiconductor factories in Korea and advanced chipmaking equipment such as extreme ultraviolet lithography machines produced by ASML.