Financial Review -The minimum market cap to get listed is about...

Financial Review -

The minimum market cap to get listed is about $15 million in equity capital, but most smaller companies manage with much less as they make up for it in the assets test, says Giri Tenneti, ASX senior manager of listed company services.

The initial fee for listing starts at $45,000, combined with an annual fee of at least $14,141 for companies with a market capitalisation of $3 million or less. Above the $3 million threshold, the annual listing fee escalates to a maximum of $475,000, depending on the size of the company.

ASX hopefuls are also expected to show an audited track record and strategy. “You have to have a future plan you’re going to deliver on,” Tenneti says.

ASX group executive of listings, Blair Beaton, adds: “I think the question is for management to determine if now is the time for them to list the size they are, or other avenues that might be more appropriate before they become larger,”

Software company YPB Group has been listed on the ASX since 2005 and commands a market cap of $1.2 million. It has produced a product that generates QR codes to be put onto product packaging for scanning, and for consumers to read product information in other languages.

“The microcap end of the market gives people opportunities to not only participate in a space, which is the authentication space in our case, and it gives them an opportunity to potentially have multiple baggers,” chairman John Houston says.

A “bagger” is market shorthand for stocks that go up by multiples of three, five, or 10 times.

“They can have multiple-bagger returns out of investing in a micro cap. And being a microcap the listing on the ASX gives us credibility that we wouldn’t be able to get if we were a private company,” Houston says.

And then there is the PUB TEST - YPB fails on ALL counts