GGRAsia – Sinophil pre-marketing follow-on share sale: reports

Sinophil pre-marketing follow-on share sale: reports

Sep 03, 2014 Newsdesk Latest News, Philippines, Top of the deck

Philippine-listed Sinophil Corp is already pre-marketing a follow-on share sale to expand its investor base, several financial media outlets are reporting.

Parent company Belle Corp will be selling the shares.

IFR, a Thomson Reuters publication, reported that book building was likely to start on September 22. IFR did not mention its sources.

FinanceAsia, another financial publication, added that pre-marketing of the PHP8.7 billion (US$200 million) follow-on share sale started on Tuesday. It said listing was scheduled for October 2, quoting term-sheets it had access to and sources close to the deal.

Hong Kong-based brokerage CLSA Ltd is the sole global co-ordinator of the operation, while Credit Suisse and Macquarie are joint bookrunners, the reports said.

Sinophil has yet to comment on the news.

The company – currently awaiting regulatory approval for a change of name to Premium Leisure Corp – on Monday announced it would adopt a dividend policy of “paying at least 80 percent of [the] previous year’s unrestricted retained earnings”. The high dividend payout policy, fuelled by eventual payments from Sinophil’s participation in the City of Dreams Manila casino resort via subsidiary Premium Leisure and Amusement Inc (PLAI), is likely one of the main selling points of the follow-on share sale.

Belle announced in June it would reorganise its gaming assets under Sinophil, including its 100-percent ownership of PLAI and its shares representing 34.5 percent of online lottery system provider Pacific Online Systems Corp.

PLAI controls Belle’s participation in City of Dreams Manila, a joint venture project with Macau-based casino operator Melco Crown Entertainment Ltd. The casino resort is forecast to open in the fourth quarter of this year.

On August 18, Belle further announced it had hired CLSA to “study the feasibility” of the company selling “a portion” of its current equity ownership in Sinophil to public investors.

Monday’s announcement said Belle currently had 50.4 percent of Sinophil but was due to enlarge its holding to about 90 percent via subscription to new shares.

Willy Ocier, Belle’s vice chairman and also chairman of Sinophil, on July 21 told GGRAsia that is was “not necessary” for Belle to own 90 percent of Sinophil, and that it was likely a portion of the 90 percent (as eventually enlarged) would be sold to the public.