June 29 (Reuters) - Bitcoin miner and AI infrastructure firm Ionic Digital filed on Monday to go public through a direct listing.
The company was formed in January 2024 to acquire the cryptocurrency mining assets of Celsius Mining, a subsidiary of Celsius, which received U.S. bankruptcy court approval for a restructuring in November 2023.
A direct listing allows a company to list its existing shares on an exchange without an underwritten offering. No new shares are created, and insiders can sell their
holdings instantly.
Ionic's registered stockholders plan to sell up to 10.8 million shares of common stock in the listing.
As part of Celsius' reorganization, Ionic issued about 37 million Class A shares to Celsius creditors, turning them into shareholders in the new company.
New Jersey-based Celsius filed for Chapter 11 protection in July 2022, one month after freezing customer accounts to prevent withdrawals. It is one of several crypto lenders to go bankrupt following the rapid growth of the industry during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Last week, Ionic raised $400 million at a pre-money valuation of $2 billion in a funding round led by new investors Attestor, Oaktree Capital Management and Sachem Head Capital Management.
Ionic plans to list its shares on Nasdaq under the symbol "IOND". J.P.Morgan, Jefferies and BTIG are the financial advisors for the listing.
(Reporting by Pragyan Kalita in Bengaluru; Editing by Vijay Kishore)
