Dubai’s RTA selects banks for taxi and parking IPOs

Image: RTA/ Twitter

Dubai’s Roads & Transport Authority (RTA) has selected Citigroup, Bank of America and Emirates NBD Capital to work on the planned initial public offering of the city’s taxi business, in what would be the emirate’s first privatisation of the year.

The transport regulator has separately appointed Emirates NBD, HSBC Holdings and Goldman Sachs Group to work on the listing of its parking division, according to people familiar with matter, who asked not to be identified as the information isn’t public.

The government plans to sell shares in the taxi business as soon as this year, while the parking unit’s listing is slated to follow next year, Bloomberg News reported last month.

RTA may add more banks at a later stage, says report

More banks may be added to the syndicates at a later stage, the people said. Representatives for BofA, ENBD, Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and HSBC declined to comment. The RTA didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.

The transport authority is exploring options to monetise more of its assets after Dubai’s government, its owner, raised $1bn from an IPO of the city’s road-toll operator, Salik Co, in 2022.

That deal drew $50bn in orders and Salik shares have risen about 57 per cent from their offer price, outperforming Dubai’s other state listings from last year.

Salik’s listing was part of Dubai’s drive to raise trading volumes in the city’s stock market by selling stakes in 10 state-owned companies. The emirate listed four assets last year and raised about $8bn, data compiled by Bloomberg show.