Infrastructure company Megawide Construction Corp. plans to re-issue via private placement the 410.842 million shares it bought back from the Sy family, an executive said over the weekend.
The share sale could raise up to P6.12 billion in proceeds based on Megawide’s closing price of P14.90 Friday. This will enable the company to register a P2-billion gain from the P4.12 billion it spent when it purchased the shares from the Sy family in July.
Megawide chief finance officer Oliver Tan said in an interview following the company’s annual shareholders meeting the share sale could happen within the year, depending on market conditions.
Tan said the re-issuance of shares aimed to expand the company’s investor base and improve the liquidity of the stock.
The company prefers to conduct the sale through private placement instead of public offering because of the regulatory process that needed to be accomplished before it could conduct the share sale.
Several local and foreign investors had expressed interest in acquiring the stake previously owned by Sybase Equity Investments Corp., a privately held company owned by the Sy family, which was equivalent to an 18-percent stake in the company.
Sybase which was a cornerstone investor of Megawide when it conducted an initial public offering in 2011 decided to divest from the construction firm as the latter planned to venture into power generation.
Sybase also has investments in National Grid Corporation of the Philippines. National Grid is prohibited from venturing into power generation under the Section 45 of the Electric Power Industry Reform Act.
Megawide set a net profit guidance of P1.9 billion this year, up 26.6 percent from P1.5 billion in 2015.