Telecommunications and internet conglomerate SoftBank has divested $1bn of shares in South Korea-based, New York-listed e-commerce group Coupang, according to a securities filing on Friday.
SoftBank Investment Advisers, the subsidiary that manages SoftBank’s Vision Funds, sold 50 million shares in the company for $20.87 apiece, leaving the firm with approximately 461 million. The news came after the corporate had unloaded $1.69bn of shares at $29.69 each in September 2021.
Founded in 2010, Coupang runs a digital marketplace that enables users to order a wide array of consumer items to be delivered to their homes. It floated on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in a $4.55bn initial public offering in March 2021, issuing 100 million shares while shareholders sold an additional 20 million.
SoftBank had paid $1bn for a 20% stake in Coupang in 2015 before transferring those shares to its first Vision Fund after it was launched. It provided a further $2bn in funding three years later at a reported $9bn valuation.
Kirk Boodry, an analyst at think tank Redex Research, told Reuters he estimates SoftBank had bought the Coupang shares for an average of $4.80 each, adding: “They are going to sell the winners…selling at a loss is not going to be very well accepted in this market.”
Coupang’s shares were trading 46% below their IPO price on Friday, representing the most acute decline in such a short amount of time for a US-listed, Asia-originated company with more than $3bn in pre-IPO funding in recent years, according to Bloomberg.
Sequoia Capital, BlackRock Private Equity Partners, Wellington Management Company, Greenoaks Capital Management, LaunchTime and Rose Park Advisors’ Disruptive Innovation Fund are also among Coupang’s other pre-IPO investors.
Photo courtesy of Coupang Inc.
