New Stocks Are Paying Off

A six-year survey of initial public offerings shows that more companies are going public and their stocks are doing well afferwards.

 

With $692.2 million already raised through 95 Initial Public Offerings in the first quarter, 1981 may exceed 1972's record dollar amount of $2.7 billion raised by 568 offerings. (The dollar has since been weakened by inflation, of course. In today's terms, the sum would be halved. Thus a truedollar record appears likely.) Whether the number of new issues themselves outpaces last year's 237 remains to be seen, but the signs are propitious: The month of April alone saw 56 companies brought to market. Even so, there will still be a long way to go to reach 1969's IPO total of 1,026. But according to a six-year review published recently in the weekly Going Public, the trend is decidedly up. Only 15 public offerings were completed in the recession year of 1974, followed by 15 again in 1975, 34 in 1976, 40 in 1977, 45 in 1978, 81 in 1979, and an impressive jump to 237 in 1980.

Further, the aftermarket performance of the 452 1975-80 new issues included in the survey seemed to assure continued investor confidence in the IPO sector. (To help readers judge for themselves, INC. is now including each IPO's first public quote.) As of December 31, 1980, a full 77% were above their offering price, with only 21% below (2% were unchanged). No fewer than 58 of them had risen by at least 500%. The standout performer for the period was St. Jude Medical, a manufacturer of heart valves, which went public through E. F. Hutton at $3.50 ($0.88 adjusted) in 1977, by the close of 1980 it was selling 2,855% higher.

Hambrecht & Quist was the most active underwriter in the six-year period, with 31 IPOs, 27 of which were up. Second was Blinder, Robinson, 24 of whose 26 low-priced new issues climbed higher. The best record of all, however, belonged to Rotan Mosle, who went 10 for 10.

The review sounds one sour note. Of the eight companies that went public on their own without an underwriter, four presently have no public market, and one has gone bankrupt. But the go-to-alone route is not altogether barren: One company's shares have doubled.

Note: This table may be divided, and additional information on a particular entry may appear on more than one screen.

INITIAL PUBLIC OFFERINGS: APRIL 1981

Offering

Company Business Size Price Approx.

($000) P/E

Scott Instruments Speech recognition tech. 3,300 2 NE

Delta Natural Gas Gas distributor 4,625 9.25 17

C-Pac Photo silver recovery 2,600 4.50 16

E.I.L. Instruments Analog/digital meters 6,000 12 24

Exploration Surveys Geophysical data 4,638 6.625 11

Gerber Systems Mfr. CAD systems 7,650 12.75 19

Management Computer software 24,000 16 70

Science America

Prairie Producing Oil & gas exploration 38,750 15.50 66

Intergraph Computer graphics 27,000 18 54

Ultimate Minicomputer hardware 5,000 6 69

Jet Industries Mfr. electric cars 7,000 1,000a NE

Silicon Electro- Single crystal ingots 3,000 6 12

Physics

Monosil Water fabrication for integr. 5,000 4 56

circuits

BIW Cable Systems Specialty cable mfr. 7,282 14.50 19

Computer Entry OCR equip. mfr. 4,900 7 22

Systems

Aero Services Int'l Ground support 4,500 3 21

Computer Magnetics Mfr. transformers 4,000 8 21

Intermagnetics Mfr. supermagnets 6,000 6 19

General

U.S. Oil Oil & gas 3,000 5be 15

Dawson Geophysical Acquires seismic data 8,905 13 42

ENS Biological Biotech. products 16,500 15 11

Greatwest Hospitals Manages hospitals 16,985 19.75 32

Reel Energy Oil & gas exploration 4,200 12b 16

Swift Independent Meat producer 37,500 15 87

Dorado Micro Rigid disk drives 15,600 13 31

Systems

Intertec Data Desktop computers 33,750 22.50 14

Systems

Pizza Time Theatre Restaurant franchise 16,000 15 41

Petroleum Offshore transport 26,750 13.375 21

Helicopters

Telesphere Int'l Telephone accounting 4,000 10 32

technology

EnerServ Products Drilling equip. 20,910 17 73

Kencope Energy Oilfield services 12,000 15 32

Fidelity Medical Cardiac testing equip. 3,000 3b 54

Video-To-Go Cassette marketing 1,500 3 S

Mizel Petro Oil & gas exploration 10,000 2.50c 59

Resources

Crawford Energy Drilling 6,750 9 45

ike Lovelady Oil & gas exploration 4,250 8.50 NE

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