TRUenergy Dares A$3B IPO in Q4 2012

The Australian market is abuzz with activity after it received a much needed shot in the arm when TRUenergy, a subsidiary of Hong Kong-listed power utility CLP Holdings Ltd., on Thursday declared it will undertake an A$3 billion (US$2.98 billion) initial public offering (IPO) listing in November this year.

It was in 2010 when Australia had its last biggest IPO, with QR National Ltd.'s A$4.6 billion, according to The Wall Street Journal. Citing data from Dealogic, the paper further reported local IPOs raised in 2011 in Australia only reached US$1.1 billion, a dismal comparison from the US$7.4 billion raised in 2010.

For this year, Australian IPOs have reached US$227 million so far.

Appointed lead managers were identified as Deutsche Bank AG, UBS AG and Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

Based from its Web site, TRUenergy has a current load of 5,469 MW of generation capacity, which include the Yallourn coal-fired power station in Victoria, an 180 MW gas-fired Hallett power station in South Australia, and a 966 MW hedge agreement with the Ecogen Newport and Jeeralang power stations in Victoria.

Andrew Brandler, Chief Executive of CLP Holdings Ltd., said in May the Hong Kong-based owner of TRUenergy wants to preserve a bulk of its controlling stake in its Australian subsidiary even after listing, but eventually noted that increasing the Australian part of its ownership could help the company improve later on.

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