(MENAFN- AFP) Two months after spinning off Hilton Hotels, investment titan Blackstone is planning a public offering of the La Quinta hotel chain in hopes of raising $100 million.Blackstone-backed La Quinta Holdings filed paperwork with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Monday to take the company public.The money raised would be used to pay down debt, which stood at about $2.8 billion on September 30, according to the filing.The mid-range hotelier, based in Irving, Texas and with 836 hotels in the United States, Canada and Mexico, was bought by Blackstone in 2006 and taken private.Blackstone values La Quinta at $4.5 billion, including debt. Upon completion of the initial public offering, Blackstone would continue to own a majority controlling stake in the company, according to the SEC filing.The number of shares being offered, their price and the date of the IPO were not detailed. La Quinta named banks JPMorgan Chase and Morgan Stanley as underwriters.La Quinta reported revenues of $673.4 million over the first nine months of 2013, an increase of 6.8 percent from the year-ago period. But net income came in at $8.6 million, about a fifth of what it was a year earlier.In December, Blackstone took Hilton Worldwide Holdings public, raising $2.35 billion in the largest IPO in the hotel sector in history and the second-biggest US market debut of 2013.
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