La Quinta Holdings Inc., Irving, Texas, raised US$650 million in its initial public offering on Tuesday, with shares closing a penny above the IPO price.
La Quinta intends to use the net proceeds from the offering, together with the net proceeds from the senior secured term loan facility of its wholly-owned subsidiary and cash on hand, to repay outstanding indebtedness, with any remaining balance to be used for general corporate purposes.
The IPO gives La Quinta a market value of US$2.1 billion. The Blackstone Group, New York City, bought LQ Management in 2006 for US$2.3 billion plus US$800 million in debt and has since spent hundreds of millions of dollars on the chain.
This marks the third hotel company Blackstone will have put up for IPOs in the past few months, having taken Extended Stay America public in November 2013 and Hilton Worldwide public in December 2013.