By Oliver Hirt
ZURICH (Reuters) - Shares in transport group Ceva Logistics
Owned by private equity firm Apollo (N:APO), Ceva Logistics raised 1.2 billion Swiss francs (886 million pounds) in an offering of new shares that included CMA CGM Group taking a roughly 25 percent stake.
By mid-session, the stock was down 8.1 percent from the offer price of 27.50 francs per share.
One market participant said the stock was too expensive compared with listed Swiss peers like Kuehne+Nagel (S:KNIN) and Panalpina (S:PWTN).
Turbulent markets have put the brakes on deals and listings, with several scrapped IPOs - including those of Chinese conglomerate HNA Group's Gategroup and Swissport in Switzerland - costing bankers money in recent months.
"Investors can take their pick given the large number of European IPOs," one banker said. "They have hardly made any money from IPOs of late so they are taking a very close look in the meantime."
Newcomers like Deutsche Bank's (DE:DBKGn) funds unit DWS (DE:DWSG) and Bavarian drugmaker Dermapharm (DE:DMPG) are trading below their issue prices.
The next test of sentiment comes with next week's listing of scientific publisher Springer Nature, which plans to raise up to 1.6 billion euros (1.4 billion pounds).
In Switzerland, the next big deal could be for packing group SIG (LON:SHI), which sources say plans an IPO in the second half.
Antibiotics group Polyphor
Ceva Logistics, whose clients include Ikea, Amazon (O:AMZN) and Volkswagen (DE:VOWG_p), is using proceeds from its share sale to reduce debt.
One person familiar with the situation said around of a quarter of the shares sold went to hedge funds and the rest mostly to institutional investors. Interest was slight from Swiss investors, especially retail, another source said.