Greencoat UK Wind launches fundraise – with the recent Walney deal having pushed up its borrowing, Greencoat UK Wind is launching a new share issuance programme and is kicking that off with a placing and offer for subscription.
Under the share issuance programme, the company may issue up to a maximum of 750 million new ordinary shares over the next 12 months.
Background
Since its initial public offering in March 2013, the company has:
- Acquired an additional 31 wind generation asset investments, increasing total net generating capacity from 127MW to 1,090MW and gross asset value (GAV) to £2.8 billion, across 37 operating wind farms.
- Paid or declared dividends of £393.8 million (47.0 pence per share)
- Increased its dividend in line with RPI each year (7.1 pence per share target for 2020)
- Grown NAV to 120.1 pence per ordinary share
- Delivered a total shareholder return of 110%
- Generated 9.9TWh of power, with the portfolio now producing enough renewable electricity to power nearly 1 million homes
The share issuance programme will:
- Be used to reduce borrowings
- Enable the company to pursue further attractive investment opportunities
- Further diversify the portfolio and associated counterparties
- Further increase the trading liquidity of UKW’s shares
- Reduce the ongoing expense ratio due to the economy of scale
- By issuing shares at a premium, enhance the NAV
The Initial Tranche
Under the programme, subject to approval by shareholders, UKW will issue new ordinary shares by way of an Initial Placing and Initial Offer for Subscription at an issue price of 131p per share. This is a discount of 7.4% to the closing share price on 2 September 2020 of 141.4p and a premium of 10.7% to the last reported NAV of 118.3p (as at 30 June 2020, adjusted for the 1.775p dividend which was paid on 28 August 2020). Shares issued under the Initial Tranche will be entitled to future dividends, including the quarterly dividend with respect to the quarter ended 30 September 2020
The Initial Tranche is expected to close on 28 September 2020. The meeting to approve the deal is on the 29th.
UKW : Greencoat UK Wind launches fundraise
when you issue the share do you look after the small share holder any share holder under 15000 shares get full issue before you scale back.
Hi John, we don’t have a role in this issue beyond just reporting on it I’m afraid. The brokers’ policy to scaling back oversubscribed issues doesn’t seem to be set in stone or regulated. It probably should be. You could try asking the FCA about it.