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Sixty three Indian corporates raised an all-time high Rs 1.18 lakh crore through main board IPOs in calendar 2021.

This was nearly 4.5 times Rs 26,613 crore raised through 15 IPOs in 2020 and almost double of the previous best year 2017 in which Rs 68,827 crore was raised.

IPOs from new age loss-making technology startups, strong retail participation and huge listing gains were the key highlights, according to Pranav Haldea, Managing Director, Prime Database Group.

Overall public equity fundraising crossed the Rs 2 lakh crore mark to reach Rs 2.02 lakh crore in calendar 2021 which was higher than the previous highest amount of Rs 1.76 lakh crore in the preceding year.

The overall response from the public was very good. Of the 59 IPOs for which data is available as of now, 36 IPOs received a mega response of more than 10 times (of which 6 IPOs more than 100 times) while 8 IPOs were oversubscribed by more than 3 times. The balance 15 IPOs were oversubscribed between 1 to 3 times.

The year witnessed tremendous response from retail investors as well. The average number of applications from retail was 14.36 lakh, in comparison to 12.77 lakh in 2020 and 4.05 lakh in 2019. The highest number of applications from retail in 2021 was received by Glenmark Life Sciences (33.95 lakhs) followed by Devyani International (32.67 lakhs) and Latent View (31.87 lakhs).

The amount of shares applied for by retail was a huge 135 per cent of the IPO mobilisation (156 per cent in 2020). However, the total allocation to retail was Rs 24,292 crore which was just 20 per cent of the total IPO mobilisation (down from 32 per cent in 2020).

According to Haldea, success of the IPOs was further buoyed by strong listing performance. Of the 58 IPOs which have got listed thus far, 34 gave a return of over 10 per cent (based on closing price on listing date). Sigachi Industries gave a stupendous return of 270 per cent followed by Paras Defence (185 per cent) and Latent View (148 per cent), 40 of the 58 IPOs are trading above the issue price (closing price of 22nd December, 2021). Average listing gain was 32 per cent, in comparison to 44 per cent in 2020 and 19 per cent in 2019.

A total of 25 out of the 63 IPOs that hit the market had a prior PE/VC investment. Offers for sale by such PE/VC investors at Rs 24,106 crore accounted for 20 per cent of the total IPO amount. Offers for sale by promoters at Rs 31,704 crore accounted for a further 27 per cent of the IPO amount. On the other hand, the amount of fresh capital raised in IPOs in 2021 was a very high Rs 43,324 crore, which was greater than the last 8 years combined.

Anchor investors collectively subscribed to 39 per cent of the total public issue amount. FPIs played a dominant role as anchor investors, with their subscription amounting to 24 per cent of the amount followed by MFs at 11 per cent. Qualified Institutional Buyers (including Anchors Investors) as a whole subscribed to 69 per cent of the total public issue amount (data for 59$ companies for which QIB and anchor investors data is available as of now). FPIs, on an overall basis as anchors and QIB, subscribed to 30 per cent of the issue amount followed by MFs at 16 per cent.

The year 2021 also saw record number of filings with SEBI. As many as 115 companies filed their offer document with SEBI for approval. According to Haldea, to put this in context, 2019 and 2020 cumulatively had a total of just 50 filings.

Following from the record number of filings, the IPO pipeline continues to remain strong with 35 companies holding SEBI approval proposing to raise roughly Rs 50,000 crore and another 33 companies which are awaiting SEBI approval to raise about Rs 60,000 crore. This, of course, excludes the much anticipated mega IPO of LIC which is expected to be launched in this fiscal.