When it comes to IPOs, the name of the game is GLOBAL

Co-authored study by Johnson’s Andrew Karolyi and reported in The Economist, says that the big IPO dollars are often more likely to come from emerging, global markets

Global and emerging markets are becoming the ticket for many companies seeking to play on the world wide economic stage.  A paper cited by The Economist and co-written by Andrew Karolyi, co-faculty director of Johnson’s Emerging Markets Institute and professor of finance at Johnson, says that indeed, at least when it comes to firms seeking initial public offering (IPO) dollars, its making more sense for some to look outside the “traditional” funding markets of America, Japan and Great Britain.

Excerpt from “Business School Research: Where to go for an IPO” (The Economist, June, 2011):

Three business-school professors looked at nearly 30,000 IPOs between 1990 and 2007 (mostly avoiding the current recession). They found that America’s share of IPO proceeds fell from 30% in the 1990s to only 21% between 2000 and 2007. The share of money raised by British and Japanese IPOs also fell, while China’s rose; in 2006 and 2007, Chinese firms actually raised more money via IPOs than American ones did.

To some degree the difference is due to American IPO values peaking during the tech bubble in the late 1990s. But the main reason is a broadening of the IPO market. Over the study period came an uptick in activity among “global” IPOs—where firms lists twice, once domestically and once in a foreign market. (It is much rarer for firms to list only in a foreign market.) In such cases, the authors found, far more money was raised from the international listing than the home one—90% more in 2007. For firms that could, it made sense to go outside the home market.