LPL Investment Holdings, the largest independent broker/dealer in the US supporting 12,000 financial advisors, raised $468 million by offering 15,657,482 shares at $30, which was a the high end of its proposed range of $27 to $30. The number of shares offered was slightly higher than the 15,614,723 shares originally planned. The Boston, MA-based company, which was founded in 1989 and is backed by private equity firms Hellman & Friedman and TPG Partners, generated over $360 million in operating cash flow on more than $3 billion in total revenue for the twelve months ended September 30, 2010. LPL Investment Holdings will begin trading on the NASDAQ on Thursday under the symbol LPLA. Goldman, Sachs & Co., Morgan Stanley, BofA Merrill Lynch and J.P. Morgan acted as lead managers on the deal.
LPL represented the 128th IPO to price so far in this year, which is more than double the 63 IPOs that were completed for all of 2009. Along with General Motor's (GM) massive $15.8 billion common share offering (also announced Wednesday evening), the U.S. IPO market has raised $17.9 billion so far in the month of November, more than doubling the $17 billion raised in the first ten months of 2010 combined.
Another six IPOs representing upwards of $1 billion capital to be raised are set to price by week's end, including a $500 million proposed offering from casino operator Caesar's Entertainment (CZR) and a $250 million IPO from microelectronics and test equipment maker Aeroflex (ARX). Even if half of this amount is completed, November 2010 could represent the largest dollar value of new issue equity capital raised in the U.S. in a single month (eclipsing the $18 billion raised in March 2008 when Visa completed the largest U.S. IPO on record).
