Saudi bourse expects to have a record year of listings in 2025, CEO says
18/02/2025 14:36
By Federico Maccioni
RIYADH Feb 18 (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia's stock exchange
1111.SE expects to have a record year of listings, CEO
Mohammed Al-Rumaih said in an interview on Tuesday.
The flurry of deals does not look close to halting and Saudi
has been one of the most active venues globally in terms of
volume in recent years, driven in part by government economic
diversification strategies.
More than 50 applications are currently under review by the
regulator and the exchange, Al-Rumaih said, adding that around
100 applications are with advisors waiting to be submitted to
the regulator.
Fifteen IPO applications have been approved, Al-Rumaih said,
speaking on the sidelines of the Capital Markets Forum in
Riyadh.
Saudi Arabia's bourse is the Gulf Arab region's largest,
with average traded value of over $1 billion. The market opened
up to foreign investors in 2015.
A run of IPOs in the Gulf has is due partly to local
governments' economic diversification strategies and listings by
private groups and family businesses.
Brokerage Derayah Financial, developer Umm Al Qura and
poultry producer Entaj are among the companies that announced
plans to float this year in Saudi Arabia, which in 2024 had the
lion share in terms of volume of listings in the Gulf and saw
significant over-subscription levels for certain offerings.
"I think on the back of very good performance of recent IPOs
(in Saudi Arabia), people still have the appetite" and
"everything is aligned to see a healthy pipeline," Mostafa Gad,
Global Head of Investment Banking at EFG Hermes, told Reuters on
the sidelines of the summit.
"I think in terms of deal count, (offerings) will be
dominated by private sector and maybe we will have some
companies that are government-owned," he said.
The healthcare, technology and education sectors will play a
big role, he added.
(Reporting by Federico Maccioni; Additional reporting by
Abinaya Vijayaraghavan, editing by Angus MacSwan)
((Abinaya.V@thomsonreuters.com;))