Belgian cable operator Telenet said on October 10 it had set the price for its initial public offering of shares at 21 euros, at the bottom of the indicative range, giving it a 2.1 billion-euro ($2.6 billion) market value.
Telenet, which competes with telecom operator Belgacom and has just rolled out digital TV services as part of its new business plan, will list on Euronext Brussels on Tuesday.
A spokesman for Telenet said the company had already signed up 40,000 digital TV clients, in line with its business plan.
Sources told Reuters on Friday the listing was likely to be priced at the lower end of the 21.0-25.5 euros price range.
Analysts had also said they expected Telenet to price near the bottom of the indicated range after Cablecom of Switzerland was taken over recently at a price below that targeted in an initial public offering.
Market sources told Reuters on Monday the offering was approximately twice oversubscribed. Some analysts were not impressed.
"That is not a very good performance in these markets where there is still a lot of interest for IPOs," one analyst said.
"Management guidance was aggressive and the company was going to an IPO with a new business plan, which is unproven," he added.
In one of the largest offerings in Belgium this year Telenet is offering new and existing shares, and will use some of the money to bring down its 1.5 billion euros of debt.
Shareholders such as municipalities, a financial consortium and holding group GIMV plan to reduce their respective stakes to a combined 28 percent from 78 percent. Liberty Global will buy shares to keep its stake at about 21 percent.
Founded in 1996, Telenet's revenues amounted to 358.8 million euros in the first half of the year.
JP Morgan, Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch and KBC Securities acted as joint bookrunners for the IPO and Goldman Sachs advised the company.
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