9 Jun 2020

Infratil announces $300m equity raising

11:03 am on 9 June 2020

Utilities investor Infratil is to raise $300 million through a share issue to expand current businesses and look for new investments.

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Photo: 123RF

The company will sell $250m worth of shares to big institutional investors and another $50m will be offered to existing shareholders.

The shares will be sold at $4.76 each, an 8 percent discount to the last traded price.

"Proceeds ... will provide additional balance sheet flexibility to fund growth investments across Infratil's existing portfolio companies and take advantage of new opportunities that may arise as a result of current market conditions," the company said in a stock exchange release.

Infratil owns just under half of telecommunications company Vodafone, and major stakes in Trustpower, Wellington Airport, US power developers, and Australian data centres.

It said its diversified portfolio of businesses with strong long-term fundamentals had proven resilient to the impact of Covid-19.

The company said it had a long track record of delivering strong returns to shareholders and maintained a 10-year total shareholder return target of 11 percent to 15-percent a year.

In it statement Infratil said it would maintain a disciplined approach to allocating capital when assessing potential investments.

The new cash would see Infratil's debt ratios fall and along with existing resources would give it a war chest of $514m for future investment.

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