The JBS Greeley meatpacking facility in Greeley, Colorado, US, on Friday, Feb. 28, 2025.
Chet Unusual | Bloomberg | Getty Pictures
Shares of Brazilian meat big JBS made their U.S. public market debut on Friday, opening at $13.65 a share.
The opening commerce values the corporate at roughly $30 billion, outstripping rival Tyson Meals’ market cap of about $19.82 billion.
JBS is now buying and selling on the New York Inventory Trade underneath the ticker “JBS,” a day later than initially anticipated. The corporate mentioned it could not conclude sure operational procedures in time to debut on Thursday. Its inventory was delisted from the Sao Paolo Trade in Brazil per week in the past as a part of the dual-listing plan.
Since its founding greater than seven many years in the past, JBS has grown to grow to be the world’s largest meatpacking firm. Final yr, the corporate reported web income of $77.2 billion and web revenue of $2 billion, in keeping with regulatory filings.
JBS operates a sprawling enterprise worldwide, with vital divisions in Brazil, the U.S. and Australia. The corporate additionally owns greater than 80% of Pilgrim’s Satisfaction, the U.S. poultry big.
JBS’s U.S. itemizing is greater than 15 years within the making. The corporate’s U.S. subsidiary first introduced plans to go public in 2009, however the transfer by no means got here to fruition after two postponements. Then, in late 2016, the corporate mentioned it will have a U.S. preliminary public providing as a part of a broader reorganization technique. However months later, the Brazilian authorities started investigating corruption within the meatpacking firm — together with amongst JBS and its prime executives.
J&F Investimentos, the holding firm that owns a controlling stake in JBS, paid a $3.2 billion tremendous in 2017 to settle bribery prices. Former chair Joesley Batista and his older brother CEO Wesley Batista, the corporate’s prime shareholders and the sons of its founder, managed to keep away from jail sentences by cooperating with prosecutors. The Batistas and J&F settled with the U.S. Securities and Trade Fee in 2020 for roughly $27 million.
The Batistas exited J&F within the wake of the scandal. Nevertheless, they returned to the corporate’s board final yr after being acquitted of insider buying and selling prices.
Extra just lately, in October, the Brazilian authorities fined JBS for purchasing cattle that have been allegedly illegally raised in protected land within the Amazon.
The corporate’s historical past of corruption and bribery allegations led to opposition to its U.S. itemizing from lawmakers on the either side of the aisle, making it look unlikely that regulators would grant their approval.
After President Donald Trump’s reelection, JBS’s subsidiary Pilgrim’s Satisfaction donated $5 million to his inaugration committee, making it the one largest donor. In an announcement to CNBC on the time, the corporate mentioned it had a “lengthy bipartisan historical past collaborating within the civic course of” and seemed ahead to working with the brand new administration.
The SEC authorized JBS’s request to listing on the New York Inventory Trade in April. JBS shareholders authorized the transfer by a slender margin the next month.
