The Cebu property firm secured the corporate regulator’s approval to sell 505 million common shares at P6.56 apiece with an overallotment option of 75 million shares, based on the prospectus it filed with the SEC. CLI’s final IPO pricing date is set on May 4.

Soberano said it’s a pride that another Cebu-based company is set to go public.

“We should be proud about it,” he said in an interview last Friday.

He said the company has so far been receiving good feedback from domestic investors in its planned IPO.

The last Cebu-based firm that went public was Metro Retail Stores of the Gaisano family in November 2015.

CLI is offering to the public at least 34 percent of its 1.714 billion outstanding common shares to raise P3.8 billion to fund its expansion plan in Visayas and Mindanao, particularly for land acquisitions and development costs.

“Seeing a compelling mix of opportunities posed by record growth in the region, we are broadening our expansion to key rapidly growing cities like Metro Davao, Cagayan de Oro, Iloilo and Bacolod,” the CEO had said.

He said the firm is developing 11 new projects this year in key VisMin cities namely Metro Davao, Cagayan de Oro, Iloilo, Bacolod and Dumaguete. These projects will comprise a mix of residential, offices, commercial and hospitality developments.

In particular, the company remains positive on the economic prospects of Cebu and the rest of the region, supported by the growing business process outsourcing (BPO) sector, remittances from Filipino workers abroad, and the tourism industry growth.

In 2016, the company’s net income reached P702 million from revenues totaling P2.18 billion, up 41.5 percent from P1.54 billion in 2015. It currently accounts for the second largest market share or 11 percent of the total supply of residential condominiums in Metro Cebu, only second to property giant Ayala Land.

Earlier, Wilcon Depot Inc. had the first IPO this year, raising as much as P7.03 billion.

Capital raised at the PSE in the first quarter of 2017 reached a record high of P67.04 billion, which came from an IPO and a follow-on offering. The previous highest amount of capital raised during the first quarter in any given year amounted to P55.90 billion in 2014.

“Our first quarter numbers are off to a good start. They provide strong basis for our target of six to eight IPOs and around P200 billion worth of capital raised this year. We hope that the additional fund raising mechanisms we have worked in the past months will provide further support to our targets,” PSE President and CEO Hans Sicat earlier said. “As global investors start going back to emerging markets, we hope to see improvement in our daily value turnover. We believe that the Philippine market continues to offer potential good returns to investors.”