flynas (XY, Riyadh) can list 30% of its shares on the Saudi Exchange, as planned, after the kingdom’s Capital Market Authority (CMA) approved a request for the move.
The carrier will offer 51,255,568 shares of its capital, the CMA said in an announcement, adding that a prospectus will be published “within sufficient time prior to the start of the subscription period”. The prospectus is set to include financial statements as well as information on management and activities.
flynas did not reply to a request for comment from ch-aviation by the time this article was published.
The low-cost carrier recorded revenue of SAR6.3 billion riyals (USD1.68 billion) for 2023, marking year-on-year growth of 32%. It has not yet posted results for 2024. Formerly known as nasair (Saudi Arabia), flynas’ biggest shareholder is Saudi conglomerate Kingdom Holding Company (with a 37% share), while the country's Public Investment Fund holds 17%, which it is allegedly seeking to increase. Kingdom Holding Company is owned by billionaire investor Al Waleed bin Talal Al Saud, a member of the royal family.
According to Al Waleed, flynas will be looking to raise around SAR7.5 billion (USD2 billion) from the IPO. The airline initially planned an IPO for 2024.
In March, ch-aviation research into Airbus’ order book confirmed that flynas had ordered fifteen A330-900Ns, twenty-six A321-200Ns, and forty-nine additional A320-200Ns (to make a total of 103 of the latter type on order), confirming an earlier MoU. It also has ten A321-200NY(XLR) on order. The carrier currently operates a fleet of 63 in-house aircraft, including four A320-200s, fifty-five A320-200Ns, and four A330-300s, ch-aviation fleets data shows.
