Business in Brief - Ben-Moshe Eyeing IPO of His Extra Energy

Ben-Moshe eyeing IPO of his Extra Energy
Moti Ben-Moshe, the entrepreneur who took control of IDB group earlier this year together with Eduardo Elsztain, is planning to float shares in his closely held German energy business. Ben-Moshe has begun preliminary meetings with investment bankers prior to a possible initial public offering in his Extra Energy, although so far no terms, including timing, structure or size, have been determined. Source say that Extra will probably be floated overseas and not in Israel, with likely candidates being New York, London or Frankfurt. In a December interview with TheMarker, Ben-Moshe estimated Extra was worth about 2 billion euros ($2.6 billion), but it will probably be valued at more. Extra’s revenues jumped 45% in 2013 to 1.6 billion euros, while net profit grew four-fold to 80 million euros. (Michael Rochvarger)

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ReWalk shares double in maiden trading day
ReWalk Robotics shares more than doubled in the first day of trading in New York Friday, ending up 113% at $25.60. The maker of exoskeletons that give mobility-impaired patients the ability to walk priced its initial public offering of three million shares at $12 each. That was a smaller number and lower price than the range that the company had earlier indicated of 3.4 million shares at $14 to $16 apiece, suggesting that its underwriters misread investor interest. While the Yokne’am Ilit-based company says there were 273,000 people in the United States living with spinal cord injury that could benefit from its technology, in 2012 and 2013 it sold just 31 Realk Rehabilitation units and only 12 ReWalk Personal units. Sales were lower year-over-year in the first quarter of 2014 as well. (TheMarker)

Pelephone losing most in cellphone wars
Pelephone, the wireless unit of Bezeq, is emerging as the biggest loser as cellular users change suppliers in the wake of the 2012 cellular revolution, said Ori Licht, telecommunications analyst at IBI Israel Brokerage & Investments, in a report issued yesterday. Although the shakeup happened more than two years ago, many subscribers are still changing providers and, in fact, the pace has accelerated since the start of the year to 201,000 a month. Licht said Pelephone had suffered the biggest drop in average revenue per user, or ARPU, among the three veteran cellular companies, with an 8 shekel ($2.20) decline, compared with 6 shekels for Partner Communications and just 3 for Cellcom Israel. Pelephone is also losing the most subscribers, he said. Shares of Bezeq climbed 0.9% to end at 6.97 shekels in Tel Aviv. (Amitai Ziv)

Delek in accord to sell Roadchef unit
Delek Group reached a binding agreement over the weekend to sell its Roadchef unit, which operates 28 motorway service areas in 20 locations in Britain, to the Paris-based investment fund Antin Infrastructure Partners. Antin will pay 153 million pounds ($248.9 million) for the business, with the sale scheduled to be completed by the end of the month. Delek, which has been offloading business outside its newly defined core area of energy, will post a 220 million-shekel ($60.6 million) gain on the sale, although because it invested so much in Roadchef over the years the real gains will be far less. Delek shares ended 0.8% up at 1,347 shekels in Tel Aviv. (Michael Rochvarger)

Tel Aviv shares drop on heavy turnover
Tel Aviv shares ended lower yesterday amid heavy turnover of 1.22 billion shekels ($340 million) for a day without any foreign investors active. The TA-25 index ended down 0.1% at 1,422.39 points while the TA-100 lost 0.3% to 1,280.76. Bank shares led the declines (see story on this page). Biomed shares were down, too, with Mazor Robotics posting its third session of sharp losses, down 5.3% to 24.25. Top gainers were Israel Chemicals, which climbed 3% to 27.70 shekels after saying Friday that it filed to list its shares in New York. Perion Network jumped 7.5% to 23.61 after Standpoint Research initiated coverage with a Buy. The government’s 10-year shekel bond fell 0.31% to raise its yield to 2.57%. (Eran Azran)