Volvo’s $2.9 billion stock IPO is a key test in shift to EVs

Volvo Auto AB is searching to increase twenty five billion kronor ($two.nine billion) in a Stockholm preliminary community presenting in a examination for automakers amid the transition to electric powered vehicles.

The Swedish carmaker, owned by China’s Zhejiang Geely Keeping Group Co., is presenting shares at 53 kronor to 68 kronor each (about $6-$eight), in accordance to a statement Monday. 

The offer values Volvo Automobiles at as much as $23 billion, 11 several years after the Chinese agency bought the small business from Ford Motor Co. for $one.eight billion. The IPO is set to be Europe’s major because January, in accordance to information compiled by Bloomberg.

The carmaker, with an bold approach to only sell entire electric powered vehicles by 2030, strategies to use the money to insert carmaking capacity so it can nearly double once-a-year product sales to far more than one.two million vehicles. Volvo Automobiles also strategies to assemble a battery plant in Europe.

“We have a incredibly very clear system to be an electric powered enterprise in 2030 and we’ve been on that journey for some several years now,” Volvo Automobiles CEO Hakan Samuelsson claimed in an interview. “With this, of study course, we can safe that transformation, since of study course, it is not absolutely free of demand.”

Volvo’s projected marketplace capitalization of about $20 billion compares to around $sixty five billion for BMW AG, when the German quality carmaker produces far more than two million vehicles compared to Volvo Cars’ 660,000 final year. More recent entrants to the industry these types of as China’s Nio Inc. and Tesla Inc. have observed their share price ranges surge previous conventional makers even as they sell only a fraction of the range of vehicles.

The IPO also arrives significantly less than a month after electric powered-automobile maker Polestar, managed by Volvo Automobiles and Geely, claimed it will go community in New York through a blank-test merger. The offer indicates an business price of $20 billion for the startup, with Volvo Automobiles anticipating to maintain a fifty% stake in Polestar after it lists.

While the century-aged Swedish industry stalwart and Polestar have similar valuations, four-year-aged Polestar has a goal of offering only about 29,000 vehicles this year.

Geely beforehand attempted to acquire Volvo Automobiles community in 2018, but named off the listing after traders have been claimed to balk at its valuation anticipations of as much as $30 billion. 

A group of pension money and institutional traders have fully commited to getting 6.four billion kronor worth of shares in the IPO.

The presenting of as much as 21% of Volvo Automobiles operates by Oct. 27, and the shares are set to get started investing in Stockholm on Oct. 28.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and SEB AB are world coordinators on the IPOs, together with bookrunners Morgan Stanley, BNP Paribas SA, HSBC Holdings Plc, JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Nordea Lender Abp. Carnegie Financial investment Lender and Swedbank AB are co-direct supervisors.

The IPO is set to be Europe’s major because Polish parcel-locker provider InPost SA’s two.eight billion-euro presenting in January.