Morgan Stanley To Lead ESR Cayman's $1.5B IPO

In a surprise move, Hong Kong-based logistics company ESR Cayman has picked the American investment bank Morgan Stanley MS to lead the relaunch of its $1.45 billion initial public offering.

What Happened

ESR and its primary investor, American private equity firm Warburg Pincus, approached the Wall Street bank in August to revive their IPO plans, Reuters reported on Tuesday.
Morgan Stanley has beaten its rivals including Deutsche Bank DB, Citigroup C, Credit Suisse CS and Goldman Sachs GS to grab the lucrative deal, even though it wasn’t a part of the equation during ESR’s first attempt at an IPO.

"It’s very rare to see a bank not working on a deal at first get a senior role as joint global coordinator (JGC) - not to mention in ESR’s case, the new bank is actually leading the relaunched deal,” a senior equity capital banker not involved in this transaction told Reuters.

ESR’s previous IPO attempt in June 2019 had Deutsche Bank and CLSA as the lead sponsors. Citigroup, Credit Suisse, DBS, and Goldman Sachs were listed as JGC.

What's Next

This time, Morgan Stanley will be leading investor meetings for ESR’s roadshow in London on Wednesday and New York on Thursday, according to Reuters.

Both Deutsche Bank and CLSA remain official sponsors as changing roles would mean restarting the entire IPO application process for ESR. 

Deutsche Bank has retained its influential JGC role as well, but CLSA has been downgraded to a bookrunner role in favor of Morgan Stanley.