Analysis of Biotech IPOs and underpricing changes as opposed to traditional IPOs

This thesis work aims to analyze in depth the peculiarities that characterize the initial public offering of a Biotech company, a world currently little explored. To do this, the focus is first on the IPO process. Subsequently, all the theories present in the literature regarding the underpricing of traditional companies are analyzed in detail. Then the focus shifts to the valuation methods of traditional companies and then to those used for biotech companies to which, due to their structural differences, traditional methods are not suitable. The thesis aims to empirically find which factors best explain the underpricing of biotech companies, starting from the theories analyzed in the theoretical chapters, related to traditional companies. In order to do so, several regression models are studied, each to thoroughly analyze a characteristic that distinguishes the biotech world. The sample illustrates 75 biotech companies that undertook the IPO process between 2017 and 2020.