Just Dial's 9.4 billion rupee IPO covered 11.6 times

REUTERS - Just Dial's up to 9.4 billion rupee ($170 million) initial public offer was subscribed 11.6 times on closing on Wednesday, in what is the biggest IPO in the country so far this year.

The response to the equity offering signals strong investor appetite for new shares, although bankers said this would unlikely open up the moribund IPO market in the near term with few medium-to-large sized issues in the pipeline.

Just Dial's IPO, in which the company's founders and private equity investors including Sequoia Capital and Tiger Globe sold some of their shares, is the biggest since Bharti Infratel Ltd's about $750 million IPO in December last year.

Although 12 IPOs were launched in the Indian market in the first quarter this year, all raised less than $100 million each.

Investors in Mumbai-based Just Dial, which offers search for local businesses through Internet and mobile platforms, were selling 17.5 million shares through the IPO in an indicative price band of between 470 rupees and 543 rupees apiece.

Just Dial is benefiting from rising income levels in Asia's third-largest economy that also has the world's second-highest number of mobile phone connections. Cheaper smartphones have helped fast growth in Internet usage.

Citigroup , which topped the Indian equity market league table as bookrunner in the first quarter of this year, and Morgan Stanley were the lead managers for the Just Dial issue.

Just Dial had first filed papers with the regulators for an IPO in 2011, but shelved the issue due to a sharp fall in the markets that affected appetite for new shares.

($1 = 55.2850 rupees)

(Reporting by Devidutta Tripathy and Sumeet Chatterjee; Editing by Anand Basu)