Coronado to List in Australia After Country's Biggest Coal IPO

(Bloomberg) -- The owners of miner Coronado Global Resources Inc. raised about A$774 million ($550 million) in Australia’s biggest coal initial public offering after selling securities at the bottom end of the marketed range.

Chess Depository Interests were sold at A$4 each, Coronado said Sunday. The CDIs were offered at A$4 to $4.80 apiece, according to a prospectus issued late last month. The bookbuild for the sale on Thursday and Friday came amid a global sell-off in commodity shares. Trading is scheduled to start on Oct. 23 on the Australian Securities Exchange.

Coronado is the biggest producer of U.S. metallurgical coal, used to make steel. Majority owned by private equity firm Energy & Minerals Group, it has mines in America’s Central Appalachian region and an operation in Australia’s Bowen Basin. Coronado decided to list in Australia after a string of bankruptcies soured U.S. investor appetite for coal, chief executive officer Garold Spindler said in an interview last month.

“We are very pleased with the make-up of our register and in particular the strong support we have received from high-quality resources and income-focused investors,” chairman Greg Martin said in the statement.

Energy & Minerals will retain a 78.9 percent stake in Coronado, according to the statement, after deciding to sell fewer CDIs than disclosed in the prospectus.

About 193 million CDIs were issued under the offer, down from 290 million. Coronado’s IPO tops Aston Resources Ltd’s A$400 million listing in 2010 as Australia’s largest coal float, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

Coronado was in a position to accelerate production at its Curragh mine in Queensland state to take advantage of strong metallurgical coal prices, Spindler said in the statement. Coronado acquired Curragh from Wesfarmers Ltd. in 2017 for A$700m.

Goldman Sachs, Bell Potter, UBS and Credit Suisse were joint sale managers on the deal.

To contact the reporters on this story: James Thornhill in Sydney at jthornhill3@bloomberg.net;Ben Sharples in Hong Kong at bsharples@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Ramsey Al-Rikabi at ralrikabi@bloomberg.net, John McCluskey, Will Davies

©2018 Bloomberg L.P.