Esprit Stones makes muted debut, shares list at 7% premium on NSE SME

Shares of small and medium enterprise (SME) Esprit Stones Ltd, a leading engineered stones manufacturer, started their trading journey on a muted note on Friday, August 2, with the stock listing at just 7% premium on the NSE Emerge platform.

The Esprit Stones stock opened the session at ₹93.15 apiece compared to the issue price of ₹87 per share. However, within minutes of trade, the stock hit the 5% upper circuit to get locked at ₹97.8 levels.

As the minimum bid quantity in the Esprit Stones IPO was 1,600 shares, successful bidders who were allotted shares in the primary issue would be sitting on a profit of at least ₹9,840 (₹6.15 x 1,600) as soon as trading began in the stock.

The ₹50.42-crore Esprit Stones IPO was open for subscription from July 26 till July 30. The offer closed with a robust subscription of almost 186 times after the three-day bidding period.

The Esprit Stones IPO had received strong demand from all segments of investors. While the quota reserved for non-institutional investors (NIIs) was the most subscribed at almost 400 times, the retail portion was overbooked by nearly 146 times. The qualified institutional buyers’ segment was subscribed 118 times.

The Esprit Stones IPO was a 100% book-built issue, comprising entirely a fresh issuance of 57.95 lakh shares.

The company had fixed a price band for the IPO at ₹82-₹87 per share, with the lot size of 1,600 shares.

Ahead of the launch of the IPO, the company also raised over ₹14 crore in its anchor round. The board of directors of the company, at its meeting held on July 25, finalised allocation of 16.12 lakh equity shares to a total of five anchor investors at a price of ₹87 per equity share.

The list of anchor investors included Founders Collective Fund, Rajasthan Global Securities Pvt. Ltd, NAV Capital VCC - Nav Capital Emerging Star Fund, Steptrade Revolution Fund and Aidos India Fund Ltd.

Esprit Stones had said that a part of the net proceeds of the issue would be utilised to fund working capital requirement of the company. Some amount from the money raised would be used to invest in the company’s subsidiary Haique Stones Pvt Ltd for repayment and/or prepayment in part or full of its outstanding borrowings and to fund its working capital requirement. The remaining funds would be used for general corporate purposes.

Founded in 2016, Esprit Stones manufactures engineered quartz and marble surfaces. Its products are used for a variety of applications, including furniture, vanities, kitchen and bathroom surfaces, work surfaces, countertops, floors, walls, special features and more.