Latham and The Law Office of Salman M. Al-Sudairi Advise on the Initial Public Offering of Saudi Aramco
Latham & Watkins and the Law Office of Salman M. Al-Sudairi advised the underwriters on the initial public offering (IPO) of Saudi Arabian Oil Company (Saudi Aramco), the largest IPO in history. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia sold 3 billion shares of Saudi Aramco in the IPO, representing 1.5% of Saudi Aramco’s share capital. In conjunction with the IPO, Saudi Aramco’s shares were listed on the Saudi Stock Exchange (Tadawul).
The final offer price per share was SAR 32 ($8.53), which was at the top end of the offer price range of SAR 30 – 32. The offering amount was SAR 96.0 billion ($25.6 billion), subject to an over-allotment option, which, if exercised in full, would increase the total offering size to up to SAR 110.4 billion ($29.4 billion). The total institutional and retail demand for the IPO was SAR 446 billion ($119 billion), or 465% of the total offer size (assuming no exercise of the over-allotment option).
The Law Office of Salman M. Al-Sudairi advised the underwriters on Saudi law matters with a team in Riyadh led by Principal Salman M. Al-Sudairi with assistance from associates Abdullah Alsaeed, Homam Khoshaim, Najla Al-Gadi and Afrah Al-Shuaiby.
Latham advised the underwriters on non-Saudi law matters with a capital markets team led by New York partners Marc Jaffe and Ian Schuman, Washington, D.C. partner Alex Cohen, London partner Craig Nethercott, Dubai partner Nomaan Raja, and Dubai counsel Basil Al-Jafari, with London associates Anna Ngo, Johan Dagergard, Jennifer Gascoyne, Sean Meehan and Neha Siddiqui. Advice was also provided on corporate matters by London partners James Inness and Jeremy Green and Houston partner Ryan Maierson, with London associates Catherine Hui, Nick Fisher, and Adam Czernikiewicz and Chicago associates Samantha Jackson and Austin Arnett; on finance matters by London partner Chirag Sanghrajka; on regulatory matters by London partner Rob Moulton, Washington, D.C. partner Paul Dudek, New York Partner Dana Fleischman, with London associate Anne Mainwaring; on antitrust matters by Brussels partner Sven Völcker with Frankfurt associate Anne Haas; and on tax matters by London partner Karl Mah and New York partner Bora Bozkurt, with London associate James Leslie and New York associate Aaron Bernstein.