KATHMANDU: Prime Commercial Bank Limited (Prime Bank) will float its shares from May 24 through issue manager Citizen Investment Trust. The bank is opening initial public offering (IPO) of 3 million unit shares worth Rs 300 million including 120,000 unit shares allocated for employees. The IPO will closed on May 27.

Three commercial banks, Citizens’ Bank International Limited, Bank of Asia and Sunrise Bank Limited, distributed shares through IPO this year. Citizens’ Bank and Bank of Asia issued IPOs equivalent to Rs 300 million each in February whereas Sunrise Bank’s IPO closed on May 6.

People’s interest in IPOs is growing by the day. Hence, IPOs are being hugely oversubscribed. Shares of Citizens’ Bank and Bank of Asia were oversubscribed by more than 10 times attracting over Rs 5 billion each.

Sunrise Bank’s IPO is the largest-ever commercial bank share issue — 37,50,000 unit shares — floated in the Nepali capital market. It also topped both banks in subscriptions with Rs 11 billion, which was 25 times more than the offered price. Prime Bank, established on September 24, 2007, has authorized capital of Rs 3 billion. Its issued capital is Rs one billion and paid up capital Rs 700 million. After IPO, its paid up capital will be Rs one billion.

The bank has a history of progress since its inception. It got net profit of Rs 28 million in fiscal year 2007-08, the first year of operations.