Line shares soar more than 50 percent in Tokyo Stock Exchange debut

Shares of Japanese messagingapp operator Line rose 51.5 percent during Friday’s trading on the Tokyo Stock Exchange after making its debut on Wall Street the previous day.

Line’s shares soared to 5,000 yen (around $47) at 10.51am local time (1.15am GMT), shortly before the midsession break in Tokyo, although its increase climbed slightly after this peak.

Line began trading today at 3,300 yen (around $32) per share, making it this year’s highest tech initial public offering (IPO) so far in Japan.

Line’s strong debut on the New York stock market yesterday also represents the largest IPO of the year in the tech sector with an initial price of $32.84 but closing at $41.58, or a 26.61 percent increase.

The Tokyobased company has decided to offer 13 million shares of its stock on the market in the Japanese capital after placing 22 million shares on the New York Stock Exchange.

The price that Line’s shares achieved on Wall Street indicates that the company’s market capitalization could reach $9 billion, including an estimate of their potential revenues in Tokyo, according to Japan’s Kyodo news agency.

Line has become the first Japanese firm to simultaneously go public on the Tokyo Stock Exchange and the New York Stock Exchange in a move aimed at boosting the company’s business abroad and improving its services to compete with its rivals overseas, according to analysts.

The Line application, which also offers free calls, debuted for public use in June 2011 and has some 218.4 million active monthly users.

The company’s net income rose to 30.9 billion yen ($306.8 million) in the JanuaryMarch quarter, up 22 percent compared to the same period in the previous year.

Line is one of the main competitors of US instant messaging application Whatsapp which now has around 1 billion active users per month.