Netmarble eligible for KOSPI listing
By Nam Hyun-woo
Game giant Netmarble Games took a step closer to its KOSPI market debut, passing the Korea Exchange’s (KRX) preliminary eligibility review.
The KRX said in a late Friday statement that its KOSPI Market committee had found the game publisher eligible for listing, giving a green light to the firm’s bid to go global through an initial public offering (IPO) next year.
In its September application, the firm said it would issue about 67.77 million shares, with 27.55 million shares locked up for six months. With market watchers expecting the offering to be worth 2 trillion won, the company’s market cap is likely to stand at up to 10 trillion won, to become the kingpin among game stocks.
As the company passed the review, it has six months to wrap up remaining listing processes, such as filing a securities registration statement, estimation of demand and pricing.
Netmarble generated about 1.07 trillion won in sales last year, with 225.3 billion won operating profit. In the first three quarters this year, Netmarble Games posted a 1.37 trillion won in earnings and a 175.7 billion won operating profit, continuing its growth for three straight years.
The growth was buoyed by the successes of "Everybody’s Marble," "Seven Knights" and "Marvel Future Fight" ― mobile titles released about two years ago which remain popular.
Accelerating momentum is the popularity of "Lineage 2 Revolution," developed by Netmarble Games’ developing subsidiary Netmarble Neo. The role-playing game is hitting its stride, sweeping the top-selling app titles in Apple’s App Store and Google’s Play on Friday, just three days after the game’s launch.
On the day of the launch, the company notched up more than 7 billion won through in-app purchase.
With its development studio assisting the publisher’s growth, market insiders expect Netmarble Games will likely push forward the listing of its subsidiaries such as Netmarble Neo, Netmarble Nexus and Netmarble Npark.
Initially, Netmarble Games was debating between the NASDAQ and the KOSPI for its IPO. The company believed that listing on the U.S. bourse would give “a great boost to its presence and corporate value in the U.S., with much lower marketing expenses,” but opted for the domestic market to get the company’s corporate value evaluated better.
Sources said Netmarble Games would use the money from the IPO for mergers and acquisitions.