Key takeaways:
- Angola raised $321 million by selling a 15% stake in Unitel, its biggest IPO yet
- The offer was oversubscribed by more than 20%
- Unitel shares begin trading on BODIVA on July 29
Angola has raised 300.3 billion kwanzas ($321 million) through the sale of a 15% stake in state-owned wireless operator Unitel, marking the country’s biggest initial public offering to date.
The Angola Debt and Securities Exchange said in a statement Monday that the government sold 7.5 million shares at 40,040 kwanzas apiece, the top end of the indicated price range. Demand for the offer reached 362.1 billion kwanzas, translating to a subscription rate of 120.72%.
A total of 17,549 orders were accepted out of 18,571 submitted during the offer period, which ran from July 6 to July 24, and more than 11,000 investors became shareholders in the country’s biggest telecommunications company as a result.
Unitel, which has more than 21 million customers, is one of the centerpieces of President João Lourenço’s push to open Angola’s state-dominated economy to private investment.
Trading of Unitel shares on Angola’s BODIVA stock exchange is scheduled to begin on July 29, adding to a small but growing list of listings on the exchange since its first flotation in 2022.
A company with a politically charged ownership history
Unitel came under state control in 2022 after Angolan authorities seized shareholdings previously owned by Isabel dos Santos, the billionaire daughter of former President José Eduardo dos Santos, and former army general Leopoldino “Dino” Nascimento.
Dos Santos had held a 25% stake in the company before it was nationalized.
Lourenço has moved since taking office to sideline powerful figures associated with the dos Santos family, who governed Angola for 38 years until 2017.
The Unitel seizure was among the most prominent examples of that broader effort to unwind the previous administration’s business networks.
Part of a wider privatization drive
The Unitel listing forms part of a broader privatization program under which Angola plans to sell stakes in 10 state-owned companies before the country’s 2027 elections.
Lourenço has framed the effort as a way to broaden domestic capital markets and reduce the state’s footprint across major industries, including telecommunications, energy and banking.
The scale of demand for the Unitel offer, which drew orders well above the shares available, signals a level of investor appetite that could support further share sales as Angola moves ahead with additional privatizations in the coming years.
