GDS Holdings announces final offering price for C-REIT IPO

GDS Holdings (GDS) announced that the final offering price for its previously announced China REIT initial public offering on the Shanghai Stock Exchange is RMB 3.00 per unit. The final offering price was determined following completion of the institutional bookbuilding, which was 166 times over-subscribed. The C-REIT will issue 800,000,000 units in total, representing 100% of units in issue on completion of the IPO. The gross proceeds to be received by the C-REIT is RMB 2,400M. At the final offering price, the implied EV / EBITDA, based on the projected EBITDA for 2026 for the C-REIT contained in the offering memorandum of RMB 141.8M, is 16.9 times. At the final offering price, the implied dividend yield per unit, based on the projected cash flow available for distribution for 2026 contained in the offering memorandum of RMB 124.8M, is 5.2 per cent. GDS will enter into an agreement to sell to the C-REIT a 100% equity interest in a project company which holds stabilized data center assets for a total enterprise value of approximately RMB 2,319M. On completion of the sale, GDS will receive total net cash proceeds of approximately RMB 2,111M, comprising equity consideration and dividend of existing cash, net of tax and certain other transaction costs. In addition, GDS will de-consolidate approximately RMB 62M of net debt and other liabilities. GDS will reinvest RMB 480M to subscribe for 20% of the units issued by the C-REIT in the IPO. GDS will continue to operate and manage the underlying data center assets under a services agreement with the project company transferred to the C-REIT, pursuant to which GDS will receive recurring annual fee income of approximately RMB 5M.