Pachinko operator Niraku plans $100 Million Hong Kong IPO

Japan pachinko parlor operator, Niraku Corp., is reported to be preparing a $100 million initial public offering on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange in the first IPO of a foreign company there since December last year, Bloomberg reports, citing unnamed sources.
The planned IPO is expected in the first half of 2015, although full details on the sale are yet to be revealed, including the appointment of investment banks or an application to the HKSE for permission to list, the report said.
The report said that Koriyama city-based Niraku is seeking to repeat the success of Dynam Japan Holdings Co. in Hong Kong, where the shares of some of the world’s biggest casino operators are traded.
Shares in Dynam, a Tokyo-based pachinko operator, have surged 47 percent in Hong Kong trading since an August 2012 IPO raising $202 million.
Pachinko games have skirted a nationwide gambling ban to become an industry taking in bets of 19 trillion yen ($175 billion), the Japan Productivity Center reports.
Niraku, founded in 1950, has 54 pachinko parlors in Tokyo and nearby areas, and in the North Eastern prefectures of Fukushima, and Miyagi. Reported sales for the year ended March fell 2.2 percent to 235.4 billion yen, following an increase of 15 percent in the previous two years, the report said.