Public Burger King offering raises $425M

Burger King Holdings Inc., the second-largest U.S. hamburger chain, raised $425 million in an initial public offering as the company begins a turnaround.

The chain sold 25 million shares at $17 each, according to a statement e-mailed by the Miami-based company Wednesday. The offering of a 19 percent stake was priced at the high end of the company's expected range of $15 to $17. The stock will trade on the New York Stock Exchange starting today under the symbol BKC.

Burger King offered shares to the public after eight straight quarters of gains in U.S. comparable-store sales. The IPO follows the departure in April of Chief Executive Officer Greg Brenneman, the second CEO in four years, after he reversed market share losses to No. 1 McDonald's Corp. and posted a profit of $47 million in the year ended June 30.

"Burger King is on some levels a great story because it has some of the best brand equity in America with the Whopper," said Allan Hickok, a restaurant-industry consultant at Restaurant and Retail Strategies LLC in Minneapolis. "The flip side is they have had issues with management, new product development and marketing."

The sale valued Burger King at about $2.26 billion. The company said it expects proceeds of $393 million.

Private-equity firms Texas Pacific Group, Bain Capital LLC and Goldman Sachs Capital Partners purchased Burger King from Diageo Plc for $1.5 billion in December 2002. The three firms own about 77 percent of the shares outstanding following the IPO. Bankers managing the offering may sell another 3.75 million shares to meet demand, which will reduce the ownership stake to 74 percent.