Precision BioSciences Inc. saw its stock increase by 9 percent on Thursday, its first day as a publicly traded company, after raising $126.4 million in its initial public offering.

The Durham, North Carolina-based genome editing company is dedicated to improving life through its proprietary ARCUS genome editing platform. Its stock closed at $17.44 per share, a 9 percent increase from its IPO price of $16.

Precision opened trading up 12.5 percent at $18. Trading on the Nasdaq under the ticker DTIL, the company saw its stock jump as high as 18.75 percent to $19 per share in its opening day.

Nearly 3.78 million shares were traded Thursday.

When it initially filed for its IPO, the company had hoped to raise $100 million. It sold 7.9 million shares in the IPO.

Precision stated in its initial Securities and Exchange Commission filing that “management will retain broad discretion” over the net proceeds from the IPO. Resources might be spent to pursue particular research programs or product candidates that are less successful or profitable as well.

The company also said it may use some of the proceeds to in-license, acquire or invest in other businesses and assets.

J.P. Morgan Securities LLC, Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC, Jefferies LLC and Barclays Capital Inc. are acting as joint book-running underwriters for the offering.

Precision has granted the underwriters a 30-day option to purchase up to 1,185,000 additional shares of common stock at the public offering price.