It’s anyone’s guess where the next Xero (ASX:XRO) or Afterpay (ASX:APT) will come from, but you may be surprised which sector is on fire right now from an IPO perspective.

In 2021 the average IPO is up 33 per cent and last year’s cohort is running almost parallel with an average gain of 34 per cent.

All sectors have their fair share of winners and losers but one sector has a particularly large share – retail.

Almost all retail IPOs in the last 12 months are above their IPO price.

Leading them is fashion retailer Cettire (ASX:CTT) which has doubled. After a fall on debut last month, fragrence retailer Dusk Group (ASX:DSK) has now gained 50 per cent.

And skincare clinic operator Silk Laser (ASX:SLA) has done well too, sitting on a 38 per cent gain.

Yesterday’s listing of beauty and wellness company EZZ Life Science (ASX:EZZ) continued this trend, with the company gaining over 50 per cent on debut. While the company doesn’t yet have brick and mortar stores, it plans to open one with the IPO proceeds.

Here’s a list of retail IPOs in the last 12 months…

Code Company IPO Price Price now % gain/loss Market Cap Specialty
UNI Universal Store 3.8 6.63 74 $388M Fashion
MYD Mydeal.com.au 1 1.05 5 $324M Furniture
BKG Booktopia 2.3 2.55 11 $369M Books
SLA Silk Laser 3.45 4.75 38 $170M Beauty
DSK Dusk Group 2 3.01 50 $126M Fragrances
CTT Cettire 0.5 1 100 $191M Fashion
ABY Adore Beauty 6.75 5.3 -22 $541M Fashion
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Other candidate sectors for top ASX IPOs

Nevertheless if you’re looking for the best performing major sector, it is healthcare with a 48 per cent gain.

The “worst” performer was Live Verdure (ASX:LV1) which is currently at parity with its IPO price.

Winners include Singular Health Group (ASX:SHG) (up 220 per cent), 4D Medical (ASX:4DX) (up over 130 per cent) and TruScreen (ASX:TRU) (up 77 per cent).

Code Company IPO price Price now % gain Market Cap
4DX 4Dmedical Limited 0.74 1.73 134 $444M
CBL Control Bionics 0.6 0.67 12 $48M
ARX Aroa Biosurgery 0.75 1.2 60 $346M
AT1 Atomo Diagnostics 0.2 0.24 20 $124M
DOC Doctor Care Anywhere 0.8 1.2 50 $213M
ICR Intelicare Holdings 0.2 0.25 25 $9M
LV1 Live Verdure 0.2 0.2 0 $7M
TRU Truscreen 0.065 0.105 77 $36.3M
CHM Chimeric Therapeutics 0.2 0.29 55 $58.0M
EZZ EZZ Life Sciences 0.5 0.72 44 TBD
SHG Singular Health 0.20 0.62 220 $57.2M
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Hot subsectors include cannabis and telcos. While both have only produced two IPOs in the last year they’ve been rippers.

While pot stocks Little Green Pharma (ASX:LGP) and Emyria – EMD (ASX: EMD) both lagged on their debut they have surged in recent weeks in conjunction with the broader cannabis sectors.

And telcos Pentanet (ASX:5GG) and Aussie Broadband (ASX:ABB) hav gained 140 per cent and 175 per cent respectively since listing.

While the resources sector still has a 35 per cent average gain, recent IPOs haven’t gone as well with some recent listees underperforming such as Metal Hawk (ASX:MHO) and Auric Mining (ASX:AWJ). Even some of the better performers such as Benz Mining (ASX:BNZ) have been historically subdued.

The worst performing sectors have been lending and BNPL. Both fintech lenders to list in 2020, Harmoney (ASX:HMY) and Plenti Group (ASX:PLT), fell on debut and haven’t recovered.

And all three BNPL IPOs of the last 12 months –  (Payright (ASX:PYR)Laybuy (ASX:LBY) and Zebit (ASX:ZBT)) – have lagged too, even in spite of continued growth from Zip Co (ASX:Z1P) and Afterpay (ASX:APT).

 

Upcoming IPOs

There are approximately a dozen IPOs to list in the next few weeks.

Listing on Friday is New Zealand based meal kit deliverer My Food Bag (ASX:MFB). Food stocks haven’t had a good record of late with Youfoodz (ASX:YFZ) shedding more than a third of its value and Forbidden Foods (ASX:FFF) falling back to parity after gaining as much as 100 per cent on its IPO day.

The most anticipated are platforms Airtasker (ASX:ART) and MadPaws (ASX:MPA) which are online market places for “tasks” and pet sitters. The listing are down for March 22 and March 26 respectively.

Arguably the closest parallel is BikeExchange (ASX:BEX) which listed a few weeks ago and is an online cycling market place. This company has been stagnant since its listing.

By virtue of over $80 million for its IPO, Airtasker will be the biggest listing so far in 2021. While it has been private it has been hailed as one of Australia’s startup success stories.

In just a few weeks, the public markets will give their own verdict.

The majority of remaining IPOs are resources, with gold dominating the list. While the recent performance of gold IPOs since the gold price began to drop doesn’t bode well, one standout is Genmin (ASX:GEN) which is in iron ore.

The most recent iron ore IPO is Akora Resources (ASX:AKO) which listed in mid-December, and while it is off all-time highs, is still sitting on a 100 per cent gain since listing.

Here’s a list of upcoming ASX IPOs…

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