Global Yellow Pages proposes share placement, rights issue to finance land purchase

Global Yellow Pages (GYP) on Wednesday proposed a share placement and rights issue to finance the purchase of a plot of land in New Zealand first announced in September.

GYP said it is proposing to place out 24 million new ordinary shares to its non-executive chairman, Mah Bow Tan, at an issue price of S$0.20 per placement share. This will amount to a total consideration of S$4.8 million.

GYP is also proposing to undertake a renounceable non-underwritten rights issue of up to 62.27 million new ordinary shares, at an issue price of S$0.20 each, on the basis of one rights share for every five existing ordinary shares.

The proposed placement is subject to, among other things, the approval of its shareholders, while the rights issue will be made pursuant to a previously approved share issue mandate.

GYP said the proceeds of both the placement and the rights issue will be used to finance the purchase of land, along with internal cash and external sources of funding.

GYP had in September said it signed a conditional agreement to buy a plot of land in Papakura, New Zealand from Motleon Limited, a company that does land development and subdivision, for NZ$38 million (S$36.6 million).

It said then that the acquisition is in line with its strategy to further develop its core property business by increasing its development pipeline and building up its property portfolio, as well as to broaden the group's revenue stream, and to pursue opportunities with good prospects for income and long-term growth.