Initial public offerings worth $1bn to hit the market this year

At least $1 billion worth of initial public offerings appear to be heading to the market within the next year and groups including Barminco and Quadrant’s gyms are likely to be among them.

It comes with news that the mining services provider and Quadrant Private Equity’s Fitness and Lifestyle Group will be presenting to fund managers at a dinner on the eve of Macquarie Group’s Australia conference next month.

The event is known to feature all of the prospective clients the investment bank has lined up for IPOs in the short term.

Barminco and Quadrant’s gyms business have been tipped as prospective IPO candidates for some time, but their names on the invite list offers a further indication a float is at the forefront of their minds.

Quadrant bought Fitness First Australia from Oaktree Capital Management in 2016 for less than $300 million, after earlier buying the Goodlife Health Clubs from Ardent Leisure for $260m along with Jetts Fitness.

IPO plans for Barminco, which is partly owned by Gresham, are not too far away, and the theory is that UBS is close to the company, which may be worth about $400m.

Barminco struck trouble in the mining downturn with too much debt, but after it was recapitalised, its earnings improved and a drawcard has been its exposure to the booming gold sector.

Also on the list is online mortgage broker Lendi, of which Macquarie Group already owns a stake, and non-bank Wingate Consumer Finance.

Whether Wingate proceeds with its IPO plans will depend on the success of the float of Latitude Financial, which is expected this year.

While not presenting at the Macquarie conference dinner, Blackstone’s chemicals operation Ixom is also expected to hit the boards in the next 12 months in a float that could be worth at least $1bn. Ixom is the chemicals division that US-based Blackstone, which has $US361bn worth of assets under management globally, purchased from listed explosives maker Orica for $750m in 2014.

Investment bank JPMorgan has been hired to sell the business but it is expected an IPO will be the most likely exit option.

Market talk suggests there is suitors for only parts of the business rather than the operation as a whole.

Other large IPOs heading to the boards are PEXA, Viva Energy and Colonial First State Global Asset Management.