IPO Watch: Albertsons Is Going Public

(RTTNews) - Albertsons Cos., Inc. revealed in a regulatory filing Friday that it plans to raise up to $1.84 billion in an initial public offering. However, the supermarket chain has not yet revealed the number of shares it plans to sell and the estimated price range.

The company said its common stock has been approved to list on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol 'ABS.'

In a Form S-1 filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Boise, Idaho-based Albertsons had filed the initial registration statement for a $100 million IPO nearly three months ago on July 8, 2015. However, that was just a nominal figure used to calculate registration fees.

Albertsons said it intends to use the net proceeds from the offering to repay debt and for general corporate purposes. The company is privately owned by a consortium led by private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management, L.P.

Goldman Sachs & Co., BofA Merrill Lynch, Citigroup, Morgan Stanley and Lazard are acting as underwriters to the IPO.

Albertsons is one of the nation's largest food and drug retailers, with both strong local presence and national scale. As of June 20, 2015, it operated 2,205 stores across 33 states under 18 well-known banners, including Albertsons, Safeway, Vons, Jewel-Osco, Shaw's, Acme, Tom Thumb, Randalls, United Supermarkets, Pavilions, Star Market and Carrs.

For fiscal 2014, Albertsons reported net loss of $1.23 billion on net sales of $27.20 billion. Identical store sales for the year were 7.2 percent. On a pro-forma basis, the company would have reported net loss of $385 million on net sales of $57.50 billion.

The IPO move comes about ten months after Albertsons completed that acquisition of rival Safeway Inc. in a $9.4 billion deal in January 2015. The merger presents a strong rival to Kroger Co. (KR), the biggest U.S. grocery store chain.

Albertsons is currently executing an annual synergy plan of about $800 million from the acquisition of Safeway, which it expects to achieve by the end of fiscal 2018, with associated one-time costs of about $690 million.