Jio IPO: Subscribe or Avoid? Check GMP, listing price prediction

One of the most anticipated public offerings of the year and the largest one in India, Jio Platforms, will open for subscription on Wednesday, October 21. The offer witnessed record demand from anchor investors and the unlisted market indicates decent listing gains as well.

The offer is a fresh issue of up to 27 crore shares, at a price band of Rs 1,065 to Rs 1,119 per share. At the upper end of the band, the offering could raise Rs 30,213 crore, making it the largest public offering in India’s history.

On Tuesday morning, the grey market premium for Jio Platforms was at Rs 246. Adding this to the upper band of the price of Rs 1,119, the expected listing price for the IPO is Rs 1,365, signaling listing gains of 21.98%.

However, the grey market is an informal space where IPO shares trade before they officially list. The market is unregulated and can swing sharply within hours.

The premium has marginally declined in the last two days, but has hovered around 20-22% over the last six sessions.

The offer saw unprecedented interest from institutional investors, with demand reportedly surpassing 30 times the amount on offer for anchor investors.

Institutional demand for the Rs 8,109.84 crore anchor book reportedly touched nearly Rs 2.5 lakh crore. These include some of the world’s largest investment firms, such as BlackRock, Capital Group, Fidelity Investments, T Rowe Price, Schroders, JPMorgan Asset Management, Franklin Templeton, Invesco, and Janus Henderson.

The IPO will open for public bidding on October 21 and will close its subscription window on October 23. Its share allotment process is expected to be completed by October 26 and Jio Platforms is likely to list on the NSE and BSE on October 28.

The price band of Jio IPO is Rs 1,065-1,119, and small investors must buy at least one lot of 12 shares, which means a minimum outlay of Rs 13,428.

Domestic brokerage firm Motilal Oswal has rated the issue ‘ subscribe’ for both listing gains and for the long term as well.

“Jio offers a combination of market leadership, healthy earnings growth and future opportunities in broadband, enterprise technology and AI. For long-term investors, the key monitorables will be ARPU growth, tariff hikes and the monetisation of digital services,” the brokerage said.