Porsche shares fall below IPO pricing

By Lucy Raitano

LONDON (Reuters) – Shares in sports car brand Porsche fell below its listing price on Monday, the third day of trading since its $72 billion listing by parent company Volkswagen.

The closely watched initial public offering (IPO) was the largest listing in Germany in more than 25 years despite a backdrop of volatile global markets.

On Monday Porsche shares fell to 81 euros, 1.8% below the IPO pricing of 82.50 euros. At 1100 GMT they were trading at 81.48 euro per share, down 1.1%.

The wider market was also down, with the pan-European STOXX 600 index losing 0.6% while a sub-index of auto stocks fell by about 1.1%.

One banker involved in the Porsche IPO said that while shares in the carmaker were down, they are doing well compared with much bigger drops on the wider market over the past three days.

Shares in Porsche avoided dropping below its IPO pricing for the first two days of trading on Thursday and Friday, closing flat at 82.50 euros both days.

A second banker involved in the deal added that risk sentiment had probably taken over, explaining Monday’s fall in Porsche shares.

Since the company made its debut, the wider autos sector is down about 5.6% while shares in parent Volkswagen are down about 10%.

As standard in an IPO, the deal includes a so-called greenshoe option allowing a stabilisation manager to purchase shares in the market at the IPO price in the first 30 days after listing to help provide price stability.

The greenshoe option on Porche’s IPO is equal to about 15% of the base offering, which will grow from 8.2 billion euros to 9.4 billion euros if the option is exercised fully.

(Reporting by Lucy Raitano; Editing by Dhara Ranasinghe and David Goodman)