Processing Your Payment

Please do not leave this page until complete. This can take a few moments.

May 21, 2008

Verso IPO comes up short

Verso Paper yesterday completed its initial public offering, netting the company roughly $150 million, about half of what it had originally hoped for.

The IPO, which began last Thursday, included 14 million shares of Verso common stock at an initial price of $12 per share. When the IPO closed yesterday, however, the stock was trading at a price of $10.46 a share, according to the Bangor Daily News. The company, which owns two paper mills in Maine, plans to use the $153.3 million it raised in the IPO to repay debt and related prepayment fees.

Verso had originally planned to offer 18 million shares at an opening price of up to $18 per share, which would have netted the company as much as $300 million. Verso CFO Robert Mundy admitted that the IPO was lower than initially expected, and blamed the general economy and weak earnings reports from other paper manufacturers for the lower price and volume, according to the Daily News.

However, shortly after the lower-than-expected IPO, the company posted good news -- record net earnings of $4 million for the first quarter.

Sign up for Enews

Mainebiz web partners

Most Recent

Most Recent

Comments

Order a PDF