The Takeovers Panel won’t stand in they way of Virgin Australia’s $350 million rights raising, the government body announced on Tuesday.
The Takeovers Panel considered the issue after a request from shareholder activist Stephen Mayne who had protested to the Virgin Australia board that retail shareholders should be able to apply for an unlimited number of shares under the rights issue.
“The Panel concluded that any shortfall will be dispersed effectively between Air New Zealand, Etihad Airways and Singapore Airlines through the sub-underwriting and synthetic sub-underwriting arrangements and that the outcome of the entitlement offer will be to maintain substantially the structure of Virgin Australia’s share register,” the Takeovers Panel decision reads.
“There may be circumstances in which a cap on subscriptions for additional shares or the use of cash settled derivatives would be unacceptable, but that is not the case here.”
