Today Pirelli is back on the Stock Exchange, an ancient name but a completely new soul of a "pure consumer tire company" increasingly focused on the high value of tyres, a sector in which the Bicocca group boasts world-leading shares. A choice of field matured in the last decade hand in hand, if not anticipating the evolution of the automotive industry oriented towards the production of high-end cars, with highly innovative technology.
So what was a sort of conglomerate of rubber and cables in the first three generations of Pirelli has become in this first glimpse of the third millennium – as the Financial Times recently wrote – a sort of Prada of tyres, driven not only media to be the sole supplier of tires for Formula 1, a niche where technology is constantly evolving. This is why Pirelli also gives the idea of a start-up with 145 years of history behind it, as defined by its operating vice president and CEO, Marco Tronchetti Provera on the day of the presentation of the IPO, which was anticipated on schedule thanks to the improvement in company results and also to the current positive trend of the world stock exchanges.
An IPO which is also the first time on the open capital market for a Chinese state holding company such as ChemChina, the giant which since 2015 has become the main shareholder of the Milanese company, entry which was followed by a takeover bid and the consequent delisting of the " old” Pirelli. One shareholder, the Chinese one of Bicocca, attracted by the "made in Italy" technology which so far has respected the history and soul of Pirelli, so much so as to sign strict governance rules in line with international best practices, leaving in the hands of Tronchetti and his team the leadership of the group and also the choice of his successor once Tronchetti will leave the offices he holds by 2020 at the age of 70.
Even if there are many expectations linked to the return to the Stock Exchange and the growth potential of the market in which Pirelli operates is in strong movement, the price of the sale offer - identical both for the public offer and for the institutional placement - is was set at 6,50 euros per share, just above the low end of the range which indicated a minimum of 6,3. But what the new Pirelli is worth, more or less than the 6,5 billion capitalization with which it presents itself on the Stock Exchange, will only be told by the market which, starting at 9 this morning, has found one of the historic stocks of the Italian Stock Exchange.
