Goddy Egene
The Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) has listed additional 4.170 billion ordinary shares of 50 kobo each of Sovereign Trust Insurance Plc at N0.50 per share. The shares resulted from the company’s rights issue that was 72.5 per cent subscribed.
The company said: “The rights issue offer was 72.5 per cent subscribed which has been considered quite commendable by industry watchers considering the bearish nature of insurance stocks in the market in recent times.”
According to the company, a breakdown of the basis of allotment shows that 99 shareholders fully accepted their rights totaling 1,262,022,678 ordinary shares, nine shareholders with provisional allotment of 25,573,204 ordinary shares partially accepted their rights totaling 6,430,000 ordinary shares while renouncing a total of 19,143,204 ordinary shares.
The insurance firm added that a total of 2,882,815,766 ordinary shares were fully renounced, while a total of 19,143,204 ordinary shares were partially renounced, bringing a total number of renounced ordinary shares to 2,901,958,970.
Shareholders of Sovereign Trust approved the new capital raising plan for the insurance company to comply with the new minimum capital requirement by the National Insurance Commission (NAICOM).
The shareholders authorised the board of the company to create 5.0 billion new ordinary shares of 50 kobo each to increase its authorised share capital to N10 billion of 20.0 billion ordinary shares of 50 kobo each. Shareholders also approved the proposal to raise “additional equity capital for the company up to the maximum of the authorised share capital” with additional mandate to the board to absorb excess money in the event of oversubscription of the initial offer.
Under its capital raising plan, Sovereign Trust Insurance could raise funds by issuing new shares to existing shareholders, new general retail investors, existing and new strategic investors or a combination of many means of capital raising.
