Nomura sets Japan stock record


Nomura Research Institute sold more stock to investors than any company listing in Japan this year, outdoing McDonald's

By Alex Frew McMillan
CNN Hong Kong

TOKYO, Japan (CNN) -- Nomura Research Institute Ltd. launched Japan's largest initial public offering of the year on Monday, as measured by the amount of stock sold.

NRI got a first day boost, closing at 14,050 yen, up 27.7 percent from its offer price.

The company, which develops computer systems and software, floated 149.6 billion yen ($1.21 billion) in stock in all, listing on the Tokyo Stock Exchange.

It offered 2 million new shares, raising 20.9 billion yen for the company, with existing shareholders like Kokusai Securities selling another 11.6 million shares.

Despite a down day in a poor year for Tokyo stocks, the new listing burst out of the gates. Its first trade saw it jump to 14,850 yen. It sold its stock at the high end of its tentative range of 10,000 yen to 11,000 yen.

Analysts noted that NRI had priced its stock for a down market.

Outdoing McDonald's float

The company's affiliate, Japan's largest brokerage Nomura Holdings, owns 5 percent of NRI. The brokerage ended Monday down 7.2 percent at 1,615 yen.

Advertising agency Dentsu had the largest IPO by market capitalization this year, with a public offering that pegged the company's value a 584 billion yen (4.7 billion).

Dentsu still outdoes NRI as the biggest company to sell stock, with NRI valued at 495 billion yen in the offering.

But Dentsu's owners only offered a tiny fraction of its stock to the public, selling 135,000 shares, worth 56.7 billion yen ($445.8 million).

By contrast, McDonald's Japan floated 113 billion yen in stock (almost $1 billion at the time) when it first sold its stock to the public in July.

NRI easily outdid that high-water mark. It scrapped earlier plans to float in October because of the September 11 attacks in the United States.

Despite NRI's blockbuster IPO, the yen was the focus of investor attention in Tokyo. The Japanese currency broke through the 128 mark against the dollar for the first time in three years, hitting 128.03 against the U.S. currency.

The Topix index, which is a little broader than the tech-driven Nikkei, ended at a three-year low on Monday, done in by pessimism about the prospect of more corporate collapses in Japan.

Reuters contributed to this report.