Saudi Aramco raised $25.6 billion in its December 2019 IPO, then the world's largest.
Saudi Aramco, formally Saudi Arabian Oil Company, is Saudi Arabia's state-controlled petroleum and natural-gas producer. Its shares began trading on the Saudi Exchange, or Tadawul, in December 2019. The offering sold about 1.5% of the company and initially valued Aramco at roughly $1.7 trillion.
The IPO surpassed Alibaba's 2014 offering, which had raised $25.0 billion, although Alibaba later exercised an overallotment option. Saudi Aramco's public listing made it one of the world's most valuable companies by market capitalization and gave international investors limited access to a company that remains majority-owned by the Saudi government.
A common mix-up is confusing the IPO amount with the company's total valuation: $25.6 billion was the money raised from shares sold, not Aramco's market value. Aramco's business includes crude-oil production, refining, chemicals and energy trading.