January 10 (SeeNews) - Slovenian state holding company SDH, which is coordinating the privatisation process in the country, cut its stake in hygiene and tissue paper producer Paloma to 30.3% from 70.97% following a successful capital increase, Paloma said.
Paloma provided no additional information in a filing with the Ljubljana bourse on Monday.
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In late December Paloma said that privately-owned investment fund Eco-Investment has increased the company's capital by 18.2 million euro ($19.3 million).
Eco-Investment acquired a 57.2% stake in Paloma via the capital increase.
"In compliance with the Takeovers Act, Eco-Investment, a.s., is obliged to publish a mandatory take-over bid subject to which existing shareholders will have the possibility to sell their shares of Paloma at minimum the same price per share as the one offered by the investor in the capital increase proceedings, as approved by the general assembly of Paloma," the company noted at the time.
In July, Paloma said it signed an 18.2 million euro recapitalisation deal with Slovak private equity fund Eco-Investment.
The agreement envisaged a share capital increase based on a bid price of 4.01 euro per share by Eco-Investment.
In January last year, Paloma's shareholders approved a proposal made by Poland-based private equity fund Abris Capital Partners to raise the Slovenian company's capital by 15 million euro, following the completion of a tender call for recapitalisation. However, in June, Abris withdrew from the agreement.
At the time, Paloma said that in case the process is not successful SDH will initiate the sale of the Paloma shares it owns.
Eco-Investment is a Slovakia-based industrial and financial holding with long-term strategic investments in industrial and production companies, primarily in the pulp and paper, tissue paper, envelopes and packaging sectors.
($=0.9439 euro)