To all - update on U.P.S. November (?) IPO.
September 21, 1999
UPS Plans Initial Offering
To Launch in Early November
By DOUGLAS A. BLACKMON
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
United Parcel Service of America Inc. hopes to launch its $3 billion initial
public offering in early November, according to the delivery concern's filings
with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
The Atlanta company filed a tentative proxy and revised registration statement
with the SEC Friday, outlining a possible schedule for the IPO. If approved,
UPS will hold a special shareholder meeting in October to approve steps
necessary for the public offering and then begin a two-week roadshow of
meetings with large institutional investors.
A UPS spokesman refused to comment on the filing. People familiar with the
matter say the company hopes to receive SEC approval of the registration as
early as this week.
Subsequent to the offering in November, the company, to be newly named
United Parcel Service Inc., will be traded on the New York Stock Exchange,
according to the filings. UPS reported revenue of $24.8 billion in 1998.
Before the IPO, UPS plans a 2-for-1 stock split
for the 547 million shares currently outstanding.
UPS isn't publicly traded, but shares of the
company are held by thousands of employees
and retirees, their relatives and heirs, and
charitable foundations tied to the company.
In previous SEC filings, UPS estimated the value
of the offering to be about $3 billion. The latest
registration says the per-share offering price
won't be set until just before the IPO. But in a
hypothetical illustration in the proposed proxy
statement, UPS uses a presplit offering price of
$70 a share, a price many analysts believe likely.
At that pricing, the IPO would total about $3.8
billion, making it the second-largest ever. Conoco
Inc. went public in an October 1998 offering that
raised $3.96 billion.
UPS also plans to seek approval at the special
shareholder meeting of a management-incentive plan under which executives
could receive as many as 600,000 stock options a year.
According to the filings, UPS plans to sell about
10% of the company to the public through the
offering of as much as 5.6 million new shares.
UPS said in the filing that current owners will
retain 99% of shareholder voting power.
Separately, UPS disclosed that earlier this month it deposited $1.35 billion with
the Internal Revenue Service in order to stop accruing interest on a contested
tax liability which could be as high as $2.35 billion. In August, UPS lost a
major tax-court decision in a long-running dispute with the IRS. UPS said it is
still weighing whether to appeal the tax-court ruling.
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