After spectacular public reception for its debut share sale, staffing firm Quess Corp gained over 50 per cent on its issue price on its first day as a publicly traded stock on Tuesday. The company’s shares, which were issued at ₹317 each, opened at ₹500, hit an intraday high of ₹508 before closing at ₹503 on the BSE.

Quess Corp’s initial public offer, which ran from June 29 to July 1, was subscribed over 144 times. The Bengaluru-based business services company raised ₹400 crore in fresh issue through the share sale.

In its June 27 note to investors advising them to subscribe to the IPO, brokerage firm Motilal Oswal said, “The company (Quess Corp) is the largest IT staff augmentation provider in India and the third largest general staffing company in India based on number of employees…The company’s profits have grown at a CAGR of 73 per cent over the last three years. The company has demonstrated capital efficiency by generating an average ROCE (return on capital employed) of 21 per cent over the last three years.”

Debt repayment, capex plans

Quess plans to use the proceeds of the public offer to repay debt, fund capital expenditure for the company and its subsidiary MFXchange US, Inc, for incremental working capital and to make acquisitions.

Of late, public issues have been getting strong response from investors.

Earlier this year, IPOs of Thyrocare Technologies was oversubscribed 73.46 times and TeamLease Services by 66 times.

The ₹1,243-crore IPO of L&T Infotech was oversubscribed 3.58 times on the second day of the offer on Tuesday. The IPO, which ends for subscription on Wednesday, received bids for 4.38 crore shares against the total issue size of 1.225 crore shares.

Analysts expect the IPO market will buzz with activity in the coming months.

The prominent companies that may tap the market include RBL Bank, GVR Infra Projects, VLCC Healthcare, Sandhar Technologies, New Delhi Centre for Sight, Nuziveedu Seeds, Hinduja Leyland Finance and Amar Ujala Publications.

comment COMMENT NOW