South Korea’s SK Innovation withdrew what would have been the largest Korean initial public offering for this year after book-building for its wholly-owned entity SK Lubricants proved to be disappointing.

The company disclosed last Friday that it filed for cancellation of the listing procedure with the Financial Supervisory Service after the two-day book building session on April 25 and 26 failed to meet pricing expectations.

SK Lubricants offered a total of 12,765,957 shares - 2,553,191 in new shares and 10,212,766 in existing shares held by SK Innovation. hopes to secure up to 1.56 trillion won (US$1.48 billion) that could have placed a heavyweight stock of a market cap of maximum 5.2 trillion won.

This was not the first time SK offered an IPO for SK Lubricants and withdrew it. SK Innovation previously considered IPOs for SK Lubricants in 2012 and again in 2015 but nixed the idea both times, stating the time was not right stating its financial health had improved.

SK Lubricants said it will now carry out global projects such as improving lube base oil processing at its JV plants in Spain and Indonesia where it is already operating two overseas plants in addition to its plant in the port city of Ulsan, 414 kilometers southeast of Seoul.

Also, Seoul based Yonhap News reported yesterday that SK Lubricants is seeking to beef up its overseas presence through joint ventures with global refiners and is eying JVs with global players to build plants in North American, as well as in China, sources said.

SK Lubricants operates a lube base oil plant in Ulsan, South Korea with a capacity to produce up to 14,000 barrels per day of API Group II and 26,000 bpd of Group III base oils. It also has a JV plant with Spain's Repsol in Cartagena with a capacity to produce 3,700 bpd Group II and 9,200 bpd Group III base oil and a JV plant with Pertamina in Dumai, Indonesia with a capacity to produce 10,000 bpd Group III base oils, as referenced above.

SK Lubricants, one of the world’s leading producers of API Group III base oil, marketed under the Yubase brand name, also manufactures and markets finished lubricants, under the ZIC brand.

SK Innovation is part of Seoul-based conglomerate SK Group.