Tidlor share prices rally on market debut

Tidlor share prices rally on market debut

Company will target low-income earners

Piyasak: Aiming for 15-20% growth
Piyasak: Aiming for 15-20% growth

Shares of Ngern Tid Lor Co Ltd (Tidlor), a microcredit provider under Bank of Ayudhya (BAY), rallied 25.34% above its initial public offering (IPO) price of 36.50 baht, hitting 55.50 baht before closing at 45.75 baht on Monday, in its debut on the Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET).

After recording the biggest IPO of the finance and securities sector worth 38.089 billion baht, the company's market cap has now surpassed 124 billion baht with the opening price of 53.50 baht ranking as the third-largest market cap in the sector following Krungthai Card (KTC) and Muangthai Capital (MTC).

Tidlor's shares ranked first both in terms of trading value and volume in Monday's morning trading session. The company recorded a trading value of 21.78 billion baht or one-third of the SET's morning trading value of 65 billion baht and 436.3 million shares traded in volume or 2.3% of the total 18,649 million shares traded in the morning session despite some glitches in the trading system due to surges in new retail investors.

Tidlor ended the day with total trading worth 33.22 billion with a trading volume of 677.83 million shares.

Pakorn Peetathawatchai, the SET president, said it is expanding the system to support the continuously growing number of users.

Tidlor is a microfinance company providing lending and hire purchase businesses, including insurance brokerage services for both life and non-life insurance products with the focus on customers earning lower than 15,000 baht a month without bank statements or salary slips.

Tidlor's managing director Piyasak Ukritnukun said the company aims to grow its microcredit businesses by 15-20% each year over the next three years while it expects the insurance brokerage business to grow above 20%.

He said the insurance brokerage business last year grew by 40% and it expects the growth this year to be close to this figure.

"Our customers' recognition for our insurance brokerage business is just 70% but it can grow quickly when the recognition reaches 100%," Mr Piyasak said.

He said customers may shift to used car registration loans as credit approval becomes more difficult. The prolonged outbreak has slowed the country's economic recovery. Businesses' demand for loans to increase their working capital have also decreased as the tourism industry which accounts for 15-20% of the country's GDP has not yet recovered.

The outbreak may have some impact on a few customers but the non-performing loan ratio is unlikely to exceed 2%, he said.

He said there are just a few thousand customers that have asked the company for financial help this year, significantly lower than last year which saw over 100,000 cases, suggesting that people are not as badly impacted by the fresh round of infections.

Mr Piyasak said extensive branch networking will serve as a major growth driver together with 5,000 partners.

This year, the company aims to open 200 new branches and raise the total number of branches to 1500, from less than 1100 branches last year, within the next few years.

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