2023
STJ advised TCV on the $57m sale of its shareholding in Grupa Pracuj, a leading HR technology company in Central and Eastern Europe, specializing in innovative solutions for talent acquisition and management.
This is a repeat transaction with TCV, who IPO’d Grupa Pracuj in November 2021 (unadvised) and retained a 12.7% holding. Leveraging on a strong relationship and prior mandates, STJ was brought onboard to provide independent advice.
STJ provided critical advice to TCV on all structural and tactical aspects of the transaction including timing, sizing, bank coordination, pricing and allocations
- Timing: Launched on the back of a strong stock rally following positive earnings results on 31st August (final price achieved was where stock was trading pre results). The share price remained elevated in the lead up to the transaction hitting historic post-IPO highs. STJ advised that TCV take advantage of the window despite challenging market conditions in particular as the wider Polish index (WIG20) performed poorly. The successful placement was achieved despite negative intraday news of rate cuts in Poland which weighed on Polish investor sentiment on the day of launch.
- Sizing: Successful sizing of the deal allowed TCV to sell c.6% of the company (c.50% of TCV’s holding) which was well subscribed with a good balance of Polish and international investors. In spite of market conditions and a low liquidity profile of the stock (€300k per day on average YTD), the full target size was executed equating to 161 days of trading versus market average of c.30 days.
- Bank coordination: STJ played an instrumental role in coordinating the bank syndicate to ensure a comprehensive outreach and thorough investor map that enabled the transaction to be widely distributed, particularly on the back of a relatively opaque Polish SMID cap demand market. Onboarding of Trigon as JBR one day prior to launch provided real incremental local demand.
- Pricing and allocations: STJ provided critical advice on the final decision around pricing versus demand allocability.
