Birkenstock officially launches IPO on NYSE

Footwear specialist Birkenstock has announced the launch of its initial public offering (IPO), with over 32 million ordinary shares to be made available via the New York Stock Exchange.

Under the ticker symbol ‘Birk’, the company said its IPO price is currently expected to be between 44 dollars and 49 dollars per ordinary share.

While Birkenstock is offering over 10.7 million of its own ordinary shares, it said a selling shareholder is offering more than 21.5 million shares, and had granted a 30-day option to purchase up to an additional 4.8 million to cover over-allotments.

Birkenstock goes public

Goldman Sachs & Co, J.P. Morgan and Morgan Stanley have been appointed as joint lead book-running managers for the proposed offering.

Plans for the IPO were confirmed early in September, when the German company said it had publicly filed a registration statement on Form F-1 with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Prior to this, speculation regarding the proposal had been circulating via a number of new outlets suggesting majority shareholder L Catterton was mulling the move to take the company public.

In addition to this, a report by Bloomberg alleged that an IPO for the retailer could value the business at more than eight billion dollars.

At the time of the announcement, Birkenstock reported that its revenues for the six months to March 31 had increased 19 percent to 644.17 million euros, yet its net profit fell from 73.5 million to 40.2 million euros.