Morgan ups stake in Redrow
ENTREPRENEUR and Wolverhampton Wanderers chairman Steve Morgan’s stake in housebuilder Redrow has grown to more than 40% as there were few subscribers to the company’s £80m share issue.
The Deeside-based company announced a plan to raise £80m last month, which it said would be used to buy more sites – particularly in London. The shares were offered at 130p, which was an 11% premium of the 117p they were trading at when the offer was announced.
Only 12.2m of the shares were taken up in the offer – or around 26.3% of the total.
However, as Morgan’s own company, Bridgmere Securities, acted as underwriter to the offer, it has acquired the remaining 34.1m shares.
This has pushed Mr Morgan’s stake in the company from 29.2% to 40.4%.
Redrow had agreed to using Bridgmere for the underwriting as it has saved the company substantial costs in completing the issue. However, shareholders needed to agree to waive an obligation by Mr Morgan to make a formal offer for the business if his shareholding passed the 29.9% threshold.
Mr Morgan founded Redrow in 1974 and floated it on the stockmarket 20 years later. He eventually stepped down from his role as chairman in 2000 but returned to the business in June 2009 as it struggled in the wake of the financial crisis and has subsequently since overseen a turnaround in its fortunes.
