At least five IPOs are seeking to raise roughly $1.5 billion this week, and some are fairly well-known names, including two transportation giants:
1) Schneider National, the second-largest U.S. trucking company, will go public at the NYSE on Thursday.
2) Azul, Brazil's third-largest airline, founded by JetBlue founder David Neeleman, is set to begin trading at the NYSE on Friday.
3) Hess Midstream, a Master Limited Partnership (MLP) that owns oil and natural gas pipelines and storage facilities in the Bakken Shale formation in North Dakota, is set to go public at the NYSE on Wednesday. It's the first midstream company since Noble Midstream, with a juicy six-percent yield.
4) Elevate Credit , which provides online loans and lines of credit to non-prime consumers, is set to trade at the NYSE on Thursday, trying to revive their IPO after pulling it over a year ago, and
5) Okta, which provides identity management software, is set to begin trading at the NASDAQ on Friday.
What's fueling the fuller calendar?
1) A record stock market. The hit another historic high in early March, and while it ended the month down slightly, the longer-term uptrend was still intact.
2) A solid first quarter for IPOs. Twenty-five IPOs raised $10 billion, according to Renaissance Capital, far above the measly eight that went public in the first quarter of 2015.
3) Solid after-market returns. The Renaissance IPO ETF, a basket of the last 60 or so IPOs, was up roughly 12% in the first quarter, better than twice the performance of the S&P 500.
There's more in the pipeline: at least five more for next week and possibly more. Would you believe a coal company? Just this morning Warrior Met Coal, a producer and exporter of metallurgical coal, announced terms for an IPO likely to happen at the NYSE next week.
Also next week: Yext, which allows businesses to sync local listings across the internet; Netshoes, an online sports retailer; and Cadence Bancorp, a Texas-based bank; and Tocagen, a cancer biotech company.
Also filed but not yet starting the roadshow: software firm Cloudera, online-only used car dealer Carvana, and ultra-low-cost airline Frontier Group.