Shares of the state-owned Ghana Oil Company (GOIL) has been oversubscribed by nearly 100 percent in its initial public offer (IPO). Sources close to the Ghana Stock Exchange (GSE) and some of the receiving brokers in the offer, were silent on specific figures, but said it was close to 100 percent. GOIL offered 42.7 percent of its shares to the public to raise GH¢17.96 million (¢179.63 billion) to carry out reinvigoration, rehabilitation and expansion programmes. With a provision that the government would release additional shares in the event of oversubscription, more than 12.9 million additional shares had been issued to bring the total shares offered to 49 percent, in an exercise which started on September 4 and ended on Friday, October 5, this year. This means that the government still has a controlling 51 percent share in the oil marketing company, which is getting set to tap into Ghana's fortune of oil discovery. During the period, the investor public had the chance to buy a minimum of 300 shares at Gp20 (¢2,000) per share, then GH¢60 (¢600,000), and thereafter in multiples of 100 shares. The mad rush for the GOIL deal shifted attention from the secondary market (the market for the purchase and sale of existing shares on the stock market) for the said month. Interestingly, the offer had the Employee Ownership Plan to cede up to five percent of the ownership to employees of the company. This was similar to what large international companies such as Google, Microsoft and even Ghana's Mechanical Lloyd, had done, emphasizing the capitalist idealogy of the well-being of the individual. The government in its budgets two years ago announced plans to divest itself considerably of some State-Owned Enterprises to afford the public the chance to invest in them and also raise funds for national development. In line with that GOIL, the State Insurance Company (SIC), Ghana Telecom, and Western Telesystems Ltd were earmarked for public floatation. Source: Daily Graphic