Royalty Pharma Plc (NASDAQ:RPRX) shares surged 59% after it made its trading debut following an upsized IPO, which braised $2.18 billion with top of the range share price.
Royalty Pharma shares close at $44.50 after IPO
The company’s shares opened Tuesday, June 16, 2020, trading in New York at $44 per share. This came after Royalty Pharma, and its stockholders sold 77.68 million shares on June 15, 2020, at $28 per share after selling 70 million of the shares between $25 and $28. The stock surged more than 60% on its debut closing at $44.50.
The Royalty Pharma IPO has been the largest public offering this year on a US exchange, further validating the dominance of listed biomedical stocks. This comes even as companies such a Vroom Inc. (NASDAQ:VRM)and Zoominfo Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ:ZI) fuel a broader market rebound. Various alternative forms of listings, more so for special acquisition companies, have boosted equity markets amid the COVID-19 pandemic. If underwrites of Royalty Pharma exercise option of selling the greenshoe stock, then the IPO will top the biggest of stock sales.
Royalty Pharma headed by investment bankers
Former investment banker Pablo Legorreta founded the company in 1996. At the end of last year, the New York-based company had already deployed around $18 billion in the acquisition of royalties form research hospitals, nonprofits, and academic institutions. Its portfolio includes neurology, oncology, HIV, diabetes, cardiology, and rare disease treatments.
Irving Investors’ portfolio manager and founder, Jeremy Abelson, indicated that the company is looking at the universe of confirmed data that helps make informed decisions. The decisions are around drugs that are likely to be successful commercially irrespective of the dynamics of the market cycle. Abelson added that it is like converting a biotechnology firm into a bond.
Besides Legorretta, who is the CEO, most of the company’s top executives are former research analysts and investment bankers. Its Vice Chairman, Chris Hite, was head of global healthcare at Citigroup while CFO Terrance Coyne was a biotech analyst at JPMorgan Chase & Co.
