EVO Payments Makes Its Stock Market Debut

EVO Payments Inc. made an impressive stock market debut on Wednesday (May 23), with share prices up as much as 26 percent after the company began trading on NASDAQ.

According to Reuters, EVO shares opened at $20.05, which was about 25 percent higher than the company’s initial public offering (IPO) price of $16.

“The offering of 14 million Class A shares by EVO Payments and selling stockholders raised $224 million, after being priced at the upper-end of its projected range,” Reuters said, adding that the company’s market valuation stood at $1.54 billion.

JPMorgan, Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Citigroup, Deutsche Bank Securities and SunTrust Robinson Humphrey are acting as the book-running managers for the IPO, and JPMorgan is acting as representative of the underwriters for the proposed offering. Barclays, Cowen Group, Goldman Sachs, PKO BP Securities, Regions Securities and William Blair are also acting as book-running managers for the proposed offering.

EVO filed for an IPO in April with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The company’s acquiring and processing services are used by merchants, financial institutions, independent software vendors, corporations and government agencies in North America and Europe, with operations in some 50 markets across the globe, according to Reuters. EVO is a principal member of Visa and Mastercard. The company’s competitors include such heavyweights as First Data, Global Payments, Vantiv and TSYS.

“The company intends to use proceeds from the IPO for buying a 19.8 percent economic interest in parent company EVO Investco LLC, through which the firm will operate and control all of the business and affairs of the parent,” Reuters said.

In late April, EVO announced its partnership with MONETA Money Bank, a leading bank in the Czech Republic, to provide payment acceptance services to MONETA’s merchant customers.