Grand Parade Investments (GPI) has taken the decision to exit the restaurant business and will unbundle the company’s stake of 9.28% (8,447,731 shares) in Spur to shareholders by way of a pro rata distribution in specie in the ratio of 1 Spur share for every 63 GPI shares held. The stake is valued at R174 million, based on the current share price of Spur of R20.65 which is equivalent to 37c per GPI share. The company will be left with its stake in gaming businesses SunWest, Golden Valley Casino and Sun Slots.
Afristrat Investment has advised that in a move to address liquidity constraints, it will commence a capital raise process to raise R60 million in cash funding from its current shareholder base. The funds will be used to settle long standing debt of c.R25 million, provide R15 million in working capital to be used in the next 12 months and R20 million to support and provide a catalyst for growth of the remaining investments of the company.
Argent Industrial repurchased 40,032 ordinary shares during March for an aggregate value of R521,118.
Net1 Technologies, which is listed on the JSE and Nasdaq, has received shareholder approval to change its name to Lesaka Technologies.
Steenkampskraal, a rare earths project in the Western Cape, has announced it is to seek a secondary listing on the JSE through a pre-initial public offering. The company also intends to list on AIM. The company will produce and sell monazite concentrate initially and progress to producing and selling mixed rate earth concentrates and separated rare earth oxides.
A number of companies listed on one of South Africa’s Stock Exchanges have initiated share buyback programmes and each week update shareholders. They are:
Investec Ltd has completed its share buy-back programme announced in March repurchasing 1,537,823 preference shares at R96,37 per share for an aggregate R148,2 million. The preference shares will be de-listed from the exchange.
Pan African Resources announced the initiation of phase one of a share buyback programme to purchase up to R50 million (£2,6 million) worth of ordinary shares over one month commencing April 1, 2022. Purchases took place on the LSE and JSE. The company repurchased in aggregate 11,825,491 ordinary shares for a total consideration of R50,3 million. A total of 7,568,744 shares were acquired on the LSE at a volume weighted average price of 21.67 pence per share and 4,256,747 shares on the JSE at a VWAP of 418.21 cents per share. All shares purchased under the programme have been cancelled.
As part of the repurchase programme announced on March 24, 2022, Reinet Investments has repurchased a further 285,271 ordinary shares at an average price of R313.34 per share for a total consideration of R89,4 million (€5,4 million)
Glencore this week repurchased 2,530,842 shares for a total consideration of £12,1 million in terms of its existing buyback programme which is expected to end in August 2022.
This week British American Tobacco repurchased 2,143,612 shares for a total of £71,36 million. The purchased shares will be held in treasury with the number of shares permitted to be repurchased set at 229,400,000.
Two companies issued cautionary notices to shareholders this week. The companies were: Trustco and Afristrat Investment.
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