NYMEX Holdings sets IPO price at $48-$52 per share

NEW YORK/WASHINGTON, Oct 18 (Reuters) - NYMEX Holdings Inc., the world's largest energy exchange, on Wednesday set the expected price of its planned initial public offering (IPO) at $48 to $52 per share.

NYMEX, owner of the New York Mercantile Exchange, did not say in the amended filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission how many shares it plans to sell. That figure is expected in future filings.

Francis Gaskins, an independent IPO analyst and president of IPO Desktop, estimates that NYMEX could have an IPO market capitalization -- meaning a market value before the offering -- of between $5 billion and $6 billion.

That figure is arrived at by comparing Nymex with price/earnings multiples of rival exchanges the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME.N: Quote, Profile, Research), IntercontinentalExchange (ICE.N: Quote, Profile, Research) and CBOT Holdings Inc. (BOT.N: Quote, Profile, Research), he said.

The New York based company will become the latest in a slew of exchanges which have transformed themselves from more established membership-based organizations into public companies, creating demand from investors for the sector.

"The exchange frenzy will make it an attractive candidate for investors," said John Orrico, portfolio manager at Arbitrage Fund. "It is a bullish market for these assets. Is it at a peak? That's the question that investors have to ask."

Orrico does not have a position in Nymex but does in other exchange stocks.

NYMEX earlier this year struck a deal to sell a 10 percent stake to private equity group General Atlantic LLC for $160 million. Under that deal, General Atlantic said it would invest an extra $10 million if NYMEX met certain conditions, such as completing an IPO valued at $2 billion or more by the end of 2006.

JPMorgan and Merrill Lynch & Co. are the lead underwriters for the offering, and NYMEX intends to list its stock on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol "NMX" (NMX.N: Quote, Profile, Research)