ARABS fails

Press, 25 September 1987, Page 10

ARABS fails

By

JOHN CALLAN, of NZPA

Wellington Australasian Racing and Breeding Stables (ARABS) will review its involvement with Ra Ora Stud after its take-over offer fell short of the neccessary acceptances ’• when it expired yesterday. ARABS, which owns 60% of Ra Ora, failed to gain acceptance from 96% of Ra Ora shareholders — the trigger level for compulsory acquisition — when its four-for-seven share exchange offer expired yesterday. When the offer closed ARABS had secured acceptances for 3,847,000 shares, said the share registry, Perkins Hargreaves.

For the offer to be unconditional, ARABS had to have . control of 5,759,850 Ra Ora shares or 90% of the shares it did not own when the offer was made. The main obstacle in the 1 way of the deal has been a dispute about the value of Ra .Ora’s rural zoned 145 ha East Tamaki property. ARABS chairman, Mr John Messara, said that Ra Ora shareholders were getting the equivalent of 270 c a share against the present traded value of about 215 c. He was sticking with his earlier statements that the offer would not be increased or extended. The “very generous offer”

valued the Ra Ora property at several times its book va|ue, he said. An unmoved and unidentified group of Ra Ora shareholders, represented by Wellington sharebroker O'Connor Grieve and Company, have maintained since May that the scrip offer was inadequate. It did not reflect the true worth of Ra Ora, said O’Connor Grieve’s analyst, Mr Graeme Thompson.

His company’s clients, who hold about 5% of Ra Ora’s issued capital, wanted a cash offer instead.

"If that’s what they want they can sell our shares and still come out ahead,”