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Naspers [JSE:NPN] on Wednesday raised approximately R24bn through the sale of 22 million ordinary Prosus shares, which appear to have been snapped up in minutes by investors.
The group earlier on Wednesday morning announced the offering, after saying it had seen significant interest in Prosus from new investors, particularly in European institutions an global technology investors.
By 08:30, just 90 minutes after the announcement of the offering was made, the sale was completed.
Each Prosus share was sold for €67.50 (about R1 080 at current exchange rates) resulting in gross proceeds of about €1.5bn (about R24bn), Naspers said in a shareholder notice on the results of the sale.
The placing is expected to increase Prosus's free-float from about 26.2% to about 27.5%. Naspers now holds about 72.5% of the issued Prosus ordinary shares.
The settlement of the placing will take place on January 24, 2020, on Euronext Amsterdam, the group said.
In September last year, Naspers listed its international internet assets on Euronext Amsterdam under Prosus, including operations and investments in online classifieds, food delivery, payments and fintech and electronic retail.
Naspers intends to use the net proceeds over time to return capital to Naspers shareholders in the form of a share repurchase programme.
- Fin24 is part of 24.com, which is in the Naspers-owned Media24 stable.
- Additional reporting by Lameez Omarjee
