SINGAPORE (THE BUSINESS TIMES) - Pegasus Asia began its trading debut at $5.01 on the mainboard of the Singapore Exchange (SGX) on Friday (Jan 21), up one cent, or 0.2 per cent, above its initial public offering (IPO) price of $5.

The special purpose acquisition company (Spac) saw some 143,900 units changing hands as at 9.14 am. Based on the trading price of $5.01 at the time, Pegasus's market capitalisation would be $170.3 million.

Pegasus is the second Spac to be listed on the SGX mainboard. Its listing comes a day after Vertex Technology Acquisition Corporation (VTAC) opened on the exchange on Thursday at $5.25. VTAC closed up 1 per cent at $5.05 on Thursday.

A third Spac, Novo Tellus Alpha Acquisition, registered its final prospectus on Thursday and is set to begin trading on Jan 27.

Pegasus is sponsored by European asset manager Tikehau Capital as well as Financiere Agache, which is luxury goods company LVMH chief executive Bernard Arnault's family office. The two companies partnered on two Spacs in Europe last year.

Pegasus is also the first Spac backed by international sponsors to list on SGX.

The Spac is offering 29.6 million units for sale to institutional and retail investors. Including the sponsors' commitment of 4.4 million units, this brings the gross proceeds raised by the Spac at IPO to $170 million.

Pegasus' international offering comprised 29 million units, which includes four million units overallotted to investors that are subject to repurchase by the company pursuant to a put option.

The Singapore tranche of the offer, for 600,000 units, was approximately 7.8 times subscribed. The offer, which closed at noon on Wednesday, received 1,108 valid applications for 4.7 million units - or $23.4 million in value.

Each unit comprises 1 new share and half of a warrant. The shares and public warrants are expected to start trading as separate counters on March 7.