Roblox Corp. RBLX,
scored a reference price of $ 45 a share from the New York Stock Exchange late Tuesday as the tween-centric gaming platform prepares to go public on a direct listing on Wednesday.
On the NYSE website, the exchange said that the company’s stock will begin trading under the ticker “RBLX” on Wednesday, adding that the reference price is not an offer price, which will be determined by buy and sell orders collected from broker. dealers.
Read: Roblox Goes Public: 5 Things You Need to Know About the Tween-Centric Gaming Platform
Direct listings differ from IPOs in that they are not backed by insurers as current stakeholders convert their ownership into shares based on trading prices in private markets. The company turned around plans for an immediate listing from a planned January IPO after receiving a new $ 520 million venture capital injection that valued the company at $ 29.5 billion.
Roblox reported revenue of $ 923.9 million and a loss of $ 257.7 million in 2020, compared to revenue of $ 508.4 million in revenue and a loss of $ 71 million in 2019, and revenue of $ 325 million and a loss of $ 88.1 million in 2018. The company aims to grow its business by retaining its pre-teen users as they age, while appealing to new users in their teens or young adulthood.
In its latest filing, Roblox said that nearly 199 million Class A shares have been registered for resale, for a total of approximately 388.2 million available. Roblox’s public debut has been expected since an IPO report circulated in October.
The past 12 months have been good for companies that went public. The Renaissance IPO ETF IPO,
is up nearly 130%, while the S&P 500 index SPX,
is up 41% and the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index COMP,
64% won.
More and more companies have opted to make direct listings public, such as Spotify Technology SA SPOT,
From Asana Inc. ASAN,
and Palantir Technologies Inc. PLTR,
Grocery store company Instacart is reportedly considering the direct listing route, while Coinbase Global Inc. has already announced his intentions.