Posts thundering success

This news of Japan Post and its IPO should really come as a motivator for our very own Indian Post.

Japan Post raised a jaw dropping $12 billion via its IPO and it got listed yesterday. People are more than thrilled because they are sitting pretty with listing gains of 16 to 33%. Just like our Modi had talked about divestment money coming in (which did not), Japan’s Abe too had voiced ambitions to go ahead with this IPO and help kick-start its sluggish economy. And unlike China, in Japan people are very risk averse and they do not really take to investing in equity. But this time, in the Japan Post IPO, it is individual investors who have stepped in big time, many of them investing for the first time ever. With everyone sitting on gains, the Govt is hopeful that they will take to equity investments.

This thundering listing success of Japan Post boosted the entire Nikkei yesterday, which was up 2.2%. The reason for this huge response to the IPO was the pricing – the Govt had priced it cheap, leaving a lot more gains on the table for the investors to take home. The Govt justified the lower price saying that Japan Post’s future growth were limited in the future and it did not want to cheat the investors and price it higher, merely on brand equity.

Wonder when we have such conscientious IPOs, which today have become more of a loot. Yes, the Govt does price it at a discount but not enough to tempt a response like Japan Post. Wish the Indian Post does the same and takes a few pointers from the Japanese.