TKC Steel pegs follow-on offer price at P9.68/share

Local steel giant TKC Steel Corp. has pegged the price of its planned follow-on offering at P9.68 per share, to raise around P2.27 billion.

The company is offering up to 235 million common shares which will increase its public ownership to 25 percent.

The company was earlier looking at selling the shares at a minimum of P8 and a maximum of P11.50 each share.

First Metro Investment Corp. is the issue manager and lead underwriter for the planned offering scheduled next month.

Proceeds from the offering will be used to acquire new facilities and improve the operation of its two subsidiaries: Treasure Steelworks Corp.   (which operates the largest billet-making plant in the country in terms of installed capacity) and Zhang Zhou Stronghold Steel Works Co. Ltd., a manufacturer of steel pipes in China.

TKC Steel has set aside P400 million for the establishment of the country’s first blast furnace in its steel production operations facility in Iligan, which is expected to double the company’s steel production output to 600,000 metric tons per year from the current 300,000 MT per annum.

Formerly listed as SQL Wizard Inc., TKC Steel is the only steel manufacturer listed in the exchange.

TKC Steel is part of the Tiu Group of Companies that also owns several businesses in the financial servicing, hospitality and tourism sectors. Among them are iRemit, an overseas remittance services company, Sterling Bank of Asia and the Discovery Hotel chain.