Shares of Saudi Aramco Base Oil Company, better known as Luberef, began trading on the Arab world's largest stock market after it raised $1.32 billion in its initial public offering.
The company's shares, which started trading under the ticker symbol “LUBEREF” on Saudi Arabia's Tadawul market, ended trading at 95 riyals ($25.33) on Wednesday, 4 per cent below the listing price.
The company's final offer price was set at the higher end of 99 riyals a share, implying a market capitalisation of about 16.71 billion riyals at listing.
The refining unit of oil company Saudi Aramco sold more than 50 million shares, or about 29.7 per cent of the company's issued share capital, with the IPO drawing strong demand from investors in the kingdom and internationally.
The institutional portion of the offering was 29.5 times oversubscribed, generating an institutional order book of about 146.4 billion riyals, the company said on Sunday.
Individual investors, who accounted for a quarter of the total offering, drew about $760 million in bids.
Luberef sold existing shares owned by private equity company Jadwa Investment, which held 30 per cent of the Aramco unit after acquiring the stake from Exxon Mobil in 2007.
Aramco owns the remaining 70 per cent and did not sell any of its shares in the offering.
Luberef's IPO plans come amid a bumper year for company listings in the Gulf and Mena regions, which is bucking the global slowdown in global markets, with Saudi Arabia and the UAE making up the majority of new listings on the back of high oil prices.
Middle East IPOs have raised about $21 billion this year — the highest share for the Gulf region after 2019 when Aramco went public in a $29 billion offering that was the world’s largest.
Last month, Americana, the largest quick-service restaurant operator in the Mena region, raised $1.8 billion from its IPO, paving the way for its listing on the Tadawul bourse and the Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange, the Arab world's two largest stock markets.
Americana's IPO is Saudi Arabia's largest IPO in 2022, with the company becoming the first to be dually listed in the kingdom and the UAE.
Luberef is Saudi Arabia's third-largest IPO this year after second-placed Nahdi Medical, the kingdom's biggest pharmacy chain, which raised $1.36 billion.
Established in 1976, Luberef operates two production plants on the west coast of the kingdom — in Yanbu and Jeddah — with a combined annual production capacity of 1.3 million metric tonnes of base oils, according to its website.
The Aramco unit makes base oils used in lubricants for motor vehicles, ships and industrial machinery.
Base oils are used across various sectors where hydraulic, turbine and transmission fluids are required in production and manufacturing machinery, such as in the steel industry, food production, textiles and clothing.
Luberef’s products are sold mainly in the company’s key end markets, including Saudi Arabia and other countries in the Mena region, Asia, the Americas and Europe, it said.
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KILLING OF QASSEM SULEIMANI
Pharaoh's curse
British aristocrat Lord Carnarvon, who funded the expedition to find the Tutankhamun tomb, died in a Cairo hotel four months after the crypt was opened.
He had been in poor health for many years after a car crash, and a mosquito bite made worse by a shaving cut led to blood poisoning and pneumonia.
Reports at the time said Lord Carnarvon suffered from “pain as the inflammation affected the nasal passages and eyes”.
Decades later, scientists contended he had died of aspergillosis after inhaling spores of the fungus aspergillus in the tomb, which can lie dormant for months. The fact several others who entered were also found dead withiin a short time led to the myth of the curse.
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War 2
Director: Ayan Mukerji
Stars: Hrithik Roshan, NTR, Kiara Advani, Ashutosh Rana
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1. Fasting
2. Prayer
3. Hajj
4. Shahada
5. Zakat
Conflict, drought, famine
Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
It has been claimed that the policies of the Ethiopian government, which took control after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in a military-led revolution in 1974, contributed to the scale of the famine.
Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.
Band Aid
Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
With Midge Ure of the band Ultravox, he wrote the hit charity single Do They Know it’s Christmas in December 1984, featuring a string of high-profile musicians.
Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.
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