Yatra’s Lackluster Debut: Lists On Bourses With A 10% Discount

Online travel agent (OTA) startup Yatra made a disappointing debut on the bourses, with its shares opening at a 10% discount to its issue price.

The stock started trading at INR 127.50 on the NSE and INR 130 on the BSE against an issue price of INR 142, a discount of 10.2% and 8.5% against the issue price, respectively.

During early intraday trading on Thursday (September 28), the shares hit a high of INR 137.90 on the NSE and INR 137.75 on the BSE, before settling at INR 135.90 on the NSE and INR 135.95 on the BSE, 6.6% and 4.6% higher than the listing price, respectively.

The listing happened largely in line with analysts’ expectations, given that the public issue, which was open for subscription between September 15 and 20, had received muted demand. 

Yatra’s IPO comprised a fresh issue of INR 602 Cr and an offer-for-sale (OFS) element of 1.21 Cr equity shares. The startup had raised INR 348.75 Cr from anchor investors last week by allocating 2.45 Cr shares. Yatra set its IPO price band at INR 135-INR 142. At the upper price band, the total IPO issue size stood at INR 773.82 Cr.

The IPO was subscribed 1.61X, with bids for 4.98 Cr equity shares against an offer size of 3.09 Cr equity shares. For comparison, Zaggle, whose IPO opened a day before Yatra’s, saw its issue oversubscribed over 12X on the last day of its offering. Meanwhile, ideaForge’s public issue was oversubscribed 106X before the startup listed at a 94% premium on the bourses.

The OTA’s IPO documents showed that it had posted losses of INR 119.5 Cr for FY21 and INR 48.2 Cr for FY22. In FY23, the company managed to post a profit of INR 7.6 Cr. However, the said profit was down to a deferred tax expense, which allowed it to offset its losses against a profit in future periods.

Yatra claims to be India’s third-largest online travel company among key OTA players in gross booking revenues and operating revenue for FY23. It competes with the likes of MakeMyTrip and EaseMyTrip. The company claims to have the most significant hotel and accommodation tie-ups amongst key domestic OTA players. 

Yatra also said in its prospectus that it is India’s leading corporate travel service provider, with 813 large corporate customers and over 49,800 registered SME customers.

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