Australian Financial Review: Tech IPOs best performers on the ASX in 2016

Tech stocks that listed on the ASX in 2016 have comfortably outshone their counterparts from other sectors, with stronger returns for shareholders in their first year of public life.

A new report from OnMarket BookBuilds, a platform that gives retail investors access to initial public offerings, found there were 25 tech listings in 2016, which delivered a 69.5 per cent return to investors.

The next strongest sector was consumer staples, where seven newly public companies returned 37 per cent for their shareholders, and the financial services sector recorded the worst performance (of sectors with a substantial number of floats), with 15 companies losing 8.1 per cent of their overall value.

The study found there was a 12.9 per cent jump in the number of IPOs in 2016, with 96 floats and average returns across sectors also increasing 3.7 per cent to 25.4 per cent.

Of the 96 floats, 25 of them were technology companies, with the second highest sector being financials, with 15 businesses.

OnMarket chief executive Ben Bucknell said this was a reflection of investors realising the power of technology stocks.

“We’ve reached a point in time where people have seen the power of mobile and it’s shifted from the early days where people would read about interesting technology ideas, to a time when people are now seeing that translated into new and exciting business models,” he said.

“There is also now the risk appetite for people to make tech investments a small part of their portfolio.”

Two of the most successful floats were of logistics software company WiseTech Global and fintech business Afterpay.