John Laing Infrastructure raises funds

John Laing Infrastructure Fund (JLIF) is calling on investors to top up its war-chest after it added some more public/private partnership (PPP) assets to its portfolio.

The investment firm is seeking to raise in the region of £60m through the issue of new shares at 106.5p per share, a very slight discount to the closing price of 108p for the company's shares on the day before the share issue was announced.

The new shares will be made available by means of an open offer, a subscription offer and a placing.

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The open offer to existing John Laing Infrastructure shareholders will be on the basis of one new share for every eight shares currently held, and is pre-emptive, which means shareholders get first crack at the newly issued shares.

John Laing Investments will not take up its open offer entitlement of around 7.8m new shares, and these are the shares that will be available for the subscription offer and placing.

JLIF announced three new PPP investments: a 37.5% shareholding in Pembury Hospital, England; a 40% shareholding in Kromhout Barracks, Netherlands; a 50% shareholding in Forth Valley Hospital, Scotland, which will give JLIF 100% ownership of the asset.

The assets, valued at £71.3m, will be acquired from the John Laing Group. The acquisitions will take the total number of PPP assets in the JLIF portfolio to 37.

There is a chance that the size of the fund-raising exercise will be increased by up to £25m if the company makes a further third party acquisition, and if so, the additional funds will be raised through the issue of shares for subscription or placing, not an open offer.

In addition, John Laing Investments wishes to place an additional 28m shares it holds in JLIF in a separate secondary placing to raise some dosh to expand its portfolio of investments, many of which, such as the recent Intercity Express Programme project, will be expected to ultimately fall into the pipeline of new projects which JLIF may acquire in future years.

If the secondary placing does take place, it is expected to occur within a period of three days after the announcement of the results of the Issue. John Laing Investments Limited has irrevocably undertaken not to offer any of its shares pursuant to the secondary placing at a price of less than the issue price (i.e. 106.5p).

JH