IPOs have been a hot topic among investors recently as a slew of multi-billion-dollar public offerings are planned to take place in 2019.
While most of these major IPOs are in the tech sector, analysts were shocked to see that one non-tech IPO ended up jumped 163 percent in a single day on the NASDAQ.
Beyond Meat (NASDAQ: BYBF) saw an amazing first day of trading as shares saw the biggest gain for an IPO since 2000 in the height of the dot-com boom.
Beyond Beef’s IPO is one that’s been followed for some time, but still remained overshadowed by larger tech companies such as Lyft (NASDAQ: LYFT), Pinterest (NYSE: PINS), and other companies still to come like Uber.
However, the plant-based meat maker ended up surpassing all of this years previous IPOs, jumping 163 percent in the course of a single day. Priced initially at $25 per share on Wednesday evening, shares of Beyond Beef began trading at $46 per share just after noon before reaching $65.75 by the end of the day.
At one point, shares reached a peak of $73, and prices are continuing to rise steadily with a 4 percent gain seen in after-hours trading at the time of writing.
This was the largest IPO surge for any U.S. company with a market cap of over $200 million in almost 20 years. The last time a company had such a strong showing was in 2000 when Palm Inc debuted in March at the height of the dot-com bubble. The next closest IPO came ten years later in December 2010, when Chinese internet company Youku.com jumped 115 percent after it debuted on the NYSE.
Overall, Beyond Beef ended the day with a $3.8 billion market cap, a significant jump from the initial $1.5 billion planned. The company sold 9.5 million shares, raising around $240 million for itself. Proceeds of the public offering will be used to grow current manufacturing facilities and construct new ones, as well as financing R&D and marketing efforts.
Just as is the case with traditional tech IPOs, Beyond Beef has never made a profit, pursuing instead a policy of rapid expansion. While profitability certainly is a nice thing to have for investors, it isn’t essential in the start-up world as many are more than willing to give up short term profits for promises of increased, long-term growth.
The company expects the plant-based, meat-alternative market to explode over the coming years. With the current global meat market valued at $1.4 trillion annually, these replacement products are expected to gobble up a considerable portion of that figure, with Beyond Beef being one of the best-positioned companies to accomplish this.
Beyond Meat Company Profile
Beyond Meat Inc is a food company based in the United States. It offers a portfolio of revolutionary plant-based meats. The company has developed three core plant-based product platforms including beef, pork and poultry.
Its flagship product is The Beyond Burger, is designed to look, cook and taste like traditional ground beef. It generates revenues primarily from sales of its products, including The Beyond Burger, Beyond Sausage, Beyond Chicken and other plant-based meat products.
Its customers include mainstream grocery, mass merchandiser and natural retailers, as well as restaurants and other foodservice outlets mainly in the United States. – Warrior Trading News
