Saudi Aramco became the world’s largest initial public offering when it began trading in December 2019.
Saudi Aramco sold shares on the Saudi Stock Exchange, or Tadawul, in December 2019. The offering raised about US$25.6 billion, and an additional share-allotment option later increased the total to roughly US$29.4 billion. That surpassed Alibaba’s 2014 offering, which had previously held the record.
The company is the national oil company of Saudi Arabia and is formally known as Saudi Arabian Oil Company. Its listing made it one of the world’s most valuable publicly traded companies and briefly placed its implied market value near US$2 trillion.
An IPO record is not the same as a market-cap record. An IPO measures money raised by selling newly listed shares, while market capitalization measures the value of all outstanding shares. Saudi Aramco’s offering also involved a relatively small percentage of the company compared with many large IPOs.