Levi 'S Cowboy IPO Rose 31.8% On The First Day And Its Market Value Reached $8 Billion 700 Million.

This Wednesday, the American leisure jeans brand Levi Strauss & Co. (Levi's, hereinafter referred to as "Levi" s) announced that it raised $623 million through initial public offering (IPO), up from the previous expected $587 million.

On Thursday, Levi 's shares were officially traded.

It climbed 31.82%, to $22.41 a share, with a market value of $8 billion 700 million.

In IPO, Levi 's set the price per share to $17, slightly higher than the previously expected $14 to $16 range.

Existing shareholders sold $462 million worth of stock, and Levi 's sold $161 million of stock.

The group will use IPO's proceeds to invest and expand its product range, while investing in Brazil and China (3% of fiscal year 2018) and new markets such as India.

According to the insiders, there are two important opportunities for Levi 's to return to the stock market at this time:

• At present, the stock market is almost historically high.

• Back to the ancient trend of return, the high waist jeans of the 90s of the last century became a hot trend again, driving the demand growth of jeans products.

But some investors questioned whether long-term investment in Levi 's would be profitable.

Dallas Hodges Capital Management fund manager Chris Terry believes that Levi s is already a very mature company with a wide distribution channel, and the shrinking of the department stores will lead to the shrinking of its customer base.

He thinks: "Levi s" has not had much room to expand the market because it is too famous.

Monetta Fund fund brand portfolio manager Robert Bacarella believes that investors' interest in their expansion plans exceeds their brand attractiveness in view of the current share price of Levi 's.

People are concerned about their specific plans to expand their market share.

J O Hambro Capital Management fund brand portfolio manager Arun Daniel's view is that if Levi 's's share price can be maintained at about 15 US dollars per share (IPO's initial pricing point), or 7.5 times the profit before interest tax depreciation and amortization, then the market's concerns about its growth rate will be eased.

In February, "Levi" announced the news of the announcement of IPO by Levi.

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As a pioneer of jeans culture, Levi 's was listed in 1971 and raised about $50 million. It was one of the largest IPO cases at that time.

But after the listing, the company's profits have declined and share price movements are not ideal.

In 1985, Levi 's was re privatized.

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The success of IPO highlights the different fortunes of retail companies in the past few years.

On the one hand, Levi s's continuously popular Cowboy brand attracts more shoppers through online channels, while tens of thousands of entity retailers have been forced to go bankrupt under the impact of Amazon providers.

In the 2018 fiscal year report released in early February this year, Levi 's sales increased by 13.7% to $5 billion 575 million over the same period, achieving two digit sales growth for fifth consecutive quarters.

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Most of them came from the growth of men's jeans business.

The largest market of the company is America, which accounts for about 55% of the total sales revenue.

Similarly, Levi s's competitors American Eagle Outfitters and Abercrombie & Fitch have also released strong performance data, driven by the surge in demand for cowboy products.

At present, Levi 's sells more than 50 thousand retail outlets worldwide, including about 3000 independent stores and store outlets.

In order to attract more young consumers, Levi 's also plans to expand the customization and printing space in its stores, providing consumers with DIY design printing denim and T-shirt services.

The success of IPO also indicates that IPO has been a bumper harvest for American enterprises in recent two years.

According to data provider Dealogic, the IPO of us enterprises totaled US $60 billion 800 million in 2018, an increase of 23% over the same period last year, the highest level since 2014.

Other popular companies that will be listed in the near future include taxi software company Lyft, Uber, photo social software developer Pinterest, online house rental platform Airbnb and business information software developer Slack.