Tracing their roots to the US, these new investment structures were hot with investors. The excitement of investing in a new-age company was dizzying. Flush with easy money looking for new places to park, investors could not get enough of these fast-growing companies. The so-called “de-spac” processes, where the listed entities acquire a “real business”, were widely-anticipated events.
The new listing framework for special purpose acquisition companies (spacs) was introduced by the Singapore Exchange (SGX) almost precisely a year ago, igniting expectations that the local bourse will soon benefit from a fresh round of trading interest with the impending listings of “unicorns” — fast-growing, high-tech entities (but not necessarily profitable, yet) — under this new listing framework.
Three spacs, Vertex Technology, Pegasus Asia and Novo Tellus Alpha, were listed quickly. Yet, since then, the fervour has cooled considerably amid an overall dampening of global IPO activity. Instead of leading a mass charge of spac listings eight months on, the first three spacs have only one another for quiet company.
