Krispy Kreme Inc. priced its initial public offering at $17 a share, down from an earlier projected range of $21 to $24 a share, as it begin trading Thursday on the Nasdaq Global Select Market. It closed Thursday at $21 a share, more than 23% above its midday debut.
The Charlotte, N.C.-based doughnut brand said Wednesday it planned to sell 29 million shares, raising about $500 million. The number of shares was increased from earlier stated plans, but the amount raised was short of the more than $600 million projected earlier in the month.
Shares were traded under the ticker symbol “DNUT.”
Krispy Kreme, which was owned by food- and consumer-goods focused investment firm JAB Holdings, had said in earlier Securities and Exchange Commission filings that it planned to use part of the IPO proceeds to pay down debt and buy back shares. JAB indicated it would hold about 78% of the Krispy Kreme shares after the offering.
Krispy Kreme also owns the Insomnia Cookies delivery brand.
It is a return to the public markets for the company. Krispy Kreme was a publicly traded company from 2000 to 2016, when JAB took the company private in a $1.35 billion deal.
Lead managers in the Krispy Kreme IPO were JPMorgan Chase & Co., Morgan Stanley, Bank of America Corp. and Citigroup Inc.
About 17 companies were scheduled to enter the public markets this week.
Update July 1, 2021: This story was updated with Krispy Kreme's Thursday closing price.
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