JMMB oversubscribed
Jamaica Money Market Brokers’ (JMMB’s) share issue which closed on Friday was oversubscribed, sources at the company told the Observer last night.
Over 12,000 individuals and institutions bought shares in the 10-year-old firm, with some 5,500 taking up the offer on Friday.
The level of oversubscription is believed to be about 30 per cent, though company officials said that JMMB officers were, up to last night, working to tabulate the final numbers.
JMMB went on the market on Monday, December 2, with an offer for sale of 234 million shares, representing 16 per cent of its total shares of 1.463 billion units. Each share was offered to the public for $4.15, but was discounted by five per cent to clients of the company, and by 30 per cent to staff and connected parties.
Having been fully subscribed, the offer raised $918 million for the owners and valued the money market pioneer at $6.07 billion.
JMMB made net profit of $644.7 million for the six months to August 31, 2002.
It projects profit of $853 million for the full financial year, March 31, 2002 to February 28, 2003. It has assets of $46 billion.
With the oversubscription of its share offer, the company will return to the investors, the portion of their shares that was not allocated to them. Based on its prospectus, JMMB had the option of increasing the percentage of its shares on offer in the event of an oversubscription, but the company apparently will not be exercising that option.
The company is expected to list on the Jamaica Stock Exchange by year-end and in Trinidad by January. It has promised to pay out between 15 per cent and 30 per cent of each year’s net profit in dividend.