Sydney – Just a year after it was pulled from the brink of insolvency, Nine Entertainment Co. announced an initial public offering that would give it a market value of around US$2 billion, the biggest ever listing of an Australian media company.
Nine said in a prospectus day that it planned to offer shares at between 2.05 Australian dollars (US$1.94) and A$2.35 each, valuing the company at up to A$2.17 billion. In October last year, lenders including U.S. hedge funds and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. agreed to a multibillion-dollar debt restructure to secure the Australian free-to-air broadcaster’s future.
Nine’s listing comes as improving stock prices and poor returns from cash and bonds due to low interest rates, which has spurred a revival in IPO activity globally.
The launch is Australia’s largest share offer since coal haulage railway network QR National listed in 2010.
The entertainment company, bought by CVC Capital Partners at the top of the market in 2007 from billionaire James Packer, was undone by a cyclical downturn in traditional media and falling advertising revenue. Since then the company has been helped by better programming and a more manageable debt load.
The Sydney-based broadcaster – which brought television to the country in the 1950s and played on Australia’s love of sports to lead TV ratings for decades – may face challenges in convincing investors to back its IPO, however.
New shareholders would own about 33% of the company, raising up to A$697.3 million and eclipsing the next-biggest media IPO; the 1999 listing of regional cable-television provider Austar, which raised A$321 million. Existing shareholders including U.S. hedge funds Apollo Global Management LLC (APO) and Oaktree Capital Management LP would own the rest.
“The price looks quite full,” said Simon Marais, managing director of fund manager Allan Gray Australia. “I don’t know if we will participate, but we probably won’t,” said Mr. Marais, who manages investments in Australian media assets including an 11% holding in newspaper publisher Fairfax Media Ltd.
Nine competes in the free-to-air television space with Seven West Media Ltd. (SWM.AU) and Ten Network Holdings Ltd. (TEN.AU).
Challenges facing the company include tepid advertising markets and the growing popularity of watching films and TV online or on pay-TV networks. Almost a third of Australian households subscribe to cable television.
At the same time, free-to-air networks in Australia still attract millions of viewers each day. Recent programming successes such as local talent show The Voice and U.S. sitcom The Big Bang Theory have brought Nine close to the top-ranked Seven network in the battle for ratings and advertising dollars. Since Feb.10, the start of the official ratings season, Seven has held a 30.7% share of viewers, compared with 29.1% for Nine, according to ratings measurement group OzTam.
Allan Gray managing director Mr. Marais said the Nine offer price appears to assume that Nine won’t lose ground in television ratings, including to the fourth-ranked Ten network, which is losing viewers. “At this price you’d have to assume that’s the case. It’s not a good deal if Ten comes back,” he said.
The challenges facing Nine – as consumers moved away from free-to-air TV and advertising revenues fell – was made worse by cash flowing out of the business on interest payments rather than investment in better programming, despite a cash injection of A$1.9 billion from CVC between 2007 and 2008.CVC last year wrote off its investment in Nine of more than A$5 billion, in what became the largest loss for a private-equity company on a single transaction in the Asian-Pacific region.
