Reuters
By Aziz El Yaakoubi
Moroccan housebuilder Residences Dar Saada, owned by Moroccan and Gulf investors, has sold shares worth 1.13 billion dirhams ($128 million) in an initial public share offer, traders said on Wednesday, the country’s first share sale this year and the second in almost three years.
In total 5.24 million existing shares were offered at 215 dirhams apiece, valuing the company at 5.3 billion dirhams.
The stock will begin trading on Casablanca’s market on Dec. 18 under the ticker symbol RDS.
No one at Residences Dar Saada could immediately be reached for comment.
The company builds low- to medium-income housing. It posted 164 million dirhams in net profit in the first half of 2014, with sales reaching 778 million dirhams, up 73 percent on the year.
The offering may help Casablanca’s stock market continue its recovery from a lack of liquidity and foreign investors and the knock-on effects of the euro zone crisis.
But the move comes weeks after Morocco’s Generale Immobiliere (CGI) said it will delist its shares, after the country’s king ordered an investigation into the state-run property developer.
And traders said small investors had not shown much interest in the latest share offer.
“Investors have become too wary of the real estate sector. CGI is delisting and Addoha’s shares have lost near 14 pct in one month” one trader said.
“With the TAQA Morocco offering last year, more than 30,000 Moroccan small investors have taken part in it. Now we could not reach 10,000,” he added.
Most of the Dar Saada buyers are Moroccan institutional investors, which have taken up to 20 pct of the offering, and foreign investors, mainly from the Gulf, which have bought up to 25 percent, traders estimate.
Gulf investors have been attracted as UAE’s Aabar Investments and Kuwait’s Kipco, through its North African unit North Africa Holding Company, already own around 10 pct each of Dar Saada. (Editing by Greg Mahlich)
