Swedish real estate group SBB secures cash with JM stake sale
12/05/2023 06:05
OSLO, May 12 (Reuters) - Troubled Swedish real estate
group SBB SBBb.ST said late on Thursday it had sold most of
its shares in construction company JM JM.ST for 2.8 billion
Swedish crowns ($275.8 million).
The transaction gives SBB a much-needed cash infusion after
scrapping a share issue earlier this week when ratings agency
S&P Global downgraded the company's debt to so-called junk
status.
Rising interest rates, soaring inflation and growing debt
have hit real estate companies in Sweden, which the country's
policymakers see as a risk to financial stability.
SBB's share price is down 62% year to date.
The company said it had sold 19 million shares in JM,
corresponding to a stake of 29.5%, at a price of 148.1 Swedish
crowns per share, reducing SBB's stake to just 2.9%.
"The sale enables a focus on the company's core business and
a further strengthening of SBB's financial position," SBB
founder and CEO Ilija Batljan said in a statement.
While SBB had said it continued to work on potential asset
sales, its chairman had recently denied in a newspaper interview
that it would divest from JM.
Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken AB (SEB) acted as sole global
coordinator and bookrunner in the share sale, SBB said.
($1 = 10.1526 Swedish crowns)
(Reporting by Terje Solsvik, Louise Rasmussen)
((terje.solsvik@thomsonreuters.com; +47 918 666 70))