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| Coupang headquarters located in southern Seoul / Korea Times file |
By Anna J. Park
Coupang's long-held dream of getting listed on the NASDAQ market seems to be one step closer to realization. The Korean e-commerce giant has been outspoken since its 2010 launch that it would pursue a NASDAQ listing to advance into overseas markets.
Coupang's specific listing timeline on the U.S. stock market is expected to be determined sometime around March; if things go well, its initial public offering (IPO) process could be completed within the first half of this year. Coupang's parent company, Coupang LLC ― the e-commerce firm's U.S.-registered corporation which owns 100 percent of Coupang's shares ― is expected to be the subject of the IPO. SoftBank's Vision Fund holds a 37 percent stake in Coupang.
According to industry sources, Coupang reportedly passed a preliminary review last month, a process necessary for its NASDAQ listing. Its main IPO underwriter Goldman Sachs is currently known to be holding a series of investor relations presentations to attract investors from both within and outside of the country.
"Once the preliminary review process is completed, the remaining procedures usually take less than three months until the actual IPO," a market insider pointed out, adding the listing is fully possible within the first half of this year.
The firm's corporate value is assessed at around $30 billion, as it grew in the double digits annually during the past five years.
However, not everything is rosy about the company's IPO plan. Market watchers think that one of the main reasons the e-commerce giant aims to accelerate its NASDAQ IPO process is to raise enough capital to buttress its e-commerce business.
Despite the fact that the firm's annual revenue in 2020 grew by more than 40 percent year-on-year, as more and more people opted to shop online than at offline stores due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the firm is still suffering from annual deficits. In 2018, the firm's annual loss exceeded 1 trillion won ($900 million), followed by another annual loss of around 700 billion won in 2019.
That's why Coupang has an important task to prove to investors how it will improve its profitability, as its cumulative annual losses could be an obstacle to its successful IPO plan.
However, local securities firms' research departments view that the firm could log its first annual profit soon, as its annual deficit has been decreasing at a rapid rate. Samsung Securities forecast in a recent report that Coupang's annual revenue in 2020 will exceed 11 trillion won with a deficit of around 215 billion won.
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