Most often, it is the largest institutional investors that get priority access to IPOs and placements because they are the biggest clients of the bank or broker running the capital raisings.
This is despite the growth in self-managed superannuation funds (SMSFs) and the growth in online broking. The growth indiates that more and more retail investors are investing for themselves. Yet retail investors only got access to 16% of the largest IPOs (raising more than $400m) in 2014.