August 23 (SeeNews) - Croatian shipping company Jadroplov [ZSE: JDPL] said on Monday that its public offering was completed successfully on Friday, as investor demand exceeded significantly the planned volume of the share issue.
“A large number of valid bids for the capital increase were submitted by foreign and local bidders and the total amount of received bids significantly exceeds the amount of the share issue,” the company said in a statement to the Zagreb bourse.
“We believe that the issue passed the success threshold defined in the offering,” it added.
The company will review the bids in the next days.
Last month, Jadroplov opened subscription for up to 2,000,000 new shares at a minimum price of 25 kuna ($3.9/3.3 euro) apiece, to be paid for in cash. The nominal value of each share is 10 kuna. Existing shareholders had no pre-emptive rights for the new share issue.
It said at the time that the public offering will be considered successful if at least one million new shares are subscribed and paid for and that investors' offers for subscription of the new shares should be worth at least 1.0 million kuna.
Jadroplov plans to use the fresh capital to renew its fleet of vessels in order to lower the average age of its fleet to between five and eight years. Last week it said it has commissioned the construction of two 63,000 dwt bulk carriers with an unnamed Chinese shipbuilder, with an option for construction of one more vessel.
The company's capital currently totals 16.37 million kuna is distributed in 1,636,674 shares with a par value of 10 kuna apiece.
Its majority shareholder with a 70.44% stake is the government agency for restructuring and sale of state assets, CERP.
Jadroplov's shares traded 7.27% higher intraday on Monday on the Zagreb bourse.
(1 euro = 7.495 Croatian kuna)