I USED to subscribe to any stock that intends to join the listed companies in the Philippine Stock Exchange, especially because as a newbie, my first introduction to IPOs is Merry Mart ($:MM).
I began to have much faith in IPOs due to the success of Merry Mart Consumer Corp., the first IPO under the COVID-19 pandemic era.
It opened at P1.50 on June 15, 2020, reached a high of 4.50 and a low of 1.30 before running a range of three pesos, give or take a few centavos.
Many traders bought cars and vans and other assets due to Merry Mart's phenomenal price performance, and considering, too, that it was the early days of the pandemic when people were suffering from financial downturns.
It was also the heyday of $:DITO and $:PGOLD and $:APL, and traders were making hay while the sun shines.
My experiences with other IPOs were dismal -- DDMP Reit, Inc. ($:DDMPR), Cebu Air Inc. Convertible Preferred Shares ($:CEBCP), etc. And also, COL Financial has not been very accommodating in giving allocations.
When the IPO of Medilines Distributors was approved by the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE), it was for P2 billion.
The company owned by Manny Villar's brother Virgilio Villar began operations in 2002 and sells medical devices including diagnostics imaging, dialysis and cancer therapy equipment.
Medilines, which trades under the symbol $:MEDIC, offered 850 million primary and secondary shares at a maximum price of P2.45.
Note that secondary shares are those personally owned by Virgilio Villar, and buying them won't directly benefit Medilines as a corporation, but will surely line the pockets of Virgilio, who by selling secondary shares is actually cashing out.
December 7, 2021 is the listing date for Medilines, and at 8:30 a.m., I scanned the Projected Opening Prices at Investagrams and saw that $:MEDIC was leading the gainers with 50% increase in price, and the biggest volume. That's around P3.45.
A few minutes later, $:MEDIC was leading the Projected Losers in the Investa list, a couple of minutes before the market opened.
So according to a tweet by Doris Dumlao-Abadilla that morning of Dec. 7, the stock $:MEDIC opened at P1.99, down from its IPO price of P2.30 per share.
Immediately, Investagrams was swamped with negative comments, memes and catcalls on the grand failure of $:MEDIC. Photos of wounded soldiers calling for "Medic" were posted.
As of this writing, 12:24 p.m. of Dec. 7, this IPO stock was trading at P1.81, down by 21.30% with volume of 467.87 M, clinching the No. 1 slot in the Top Losers category for the day.
The chickens have come home to roost for B. Braun's former man. Remember that during the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee hearings on the irregularities in PhilHealth, B. Braun was cited as having a role?
This atheist columnist can only thank "god" for keeping me away from the $:MEDIC initial public offering, he-he-he!