(By Balachander) Blackhawk Network Holdings, the gift card and payment services unit of supermarket chain Safeway Inc. (NYSE: SWY), has filed to raise up to $200 million in an initial public offering (IPO) of Class A common stock.
The filing with the U.S. federal regulators did not disclose how many shares the company plans to offer or the pricing terms.
Pleasanton, California-based Blackhawk Network offers gift cards from leading consumer brands such as Amazon.com (AMZN), Applebee's, iTunes, Lowe's (L), Macy's (M)and Starbucks (SBUX) and from payment networks such as American Express (AXP), MasterCard (MA) and Visa (V).
For the year 2012, the company posted adjusted earnings of $50 million on revenue of $959 million. It processed a total load value of $8.5 billion and over 216 million load transactions during the last year.
Safeway currently owns roughly 96 percent of Blackhawk and will continue to hold shares of Class B common stock in the unit after the offering, according to the regulatory filing.
Blackhawk, founded in 2001, plans to trade on the NASDAQ under the symbol "HAWK."
Goldman Sachs, Bank of America/Merrill Lynch, Citigroup and Deutsche Bank Securities are serving as co-lead underwriters on the offering.