Troy to sell Kearns stake

Press, 25 January 1988, Page 26

Troy to sell Kearns stake

Troy Corp will sell its 34 per cent of Christchurchbased Kearns Corp to the Australian financial services company, Duke Securities, Ltd. Mr Keith Palmer, Troy's managing director, said the

sale concluded Troy’s divestment of its interests in financial services. “Troy started out as a bloodstock company and property developer and those will again be our main activities,” he said. “Since December we have sold our 50 per cent stake in Kendal Waller, a private mortgage broker, and 10 per

cent of Akron Corporation.” “We sold our stake in Kearns at a slight premium to the market and we sold it for more than what we paid,” he said.

Troy brought two separate parcels of Kearns shares — one at the end of 1986 and Equiticorp Holding’s stake last August. Kearns’ share price at the last trade was 187 c.

Just before the October sharemarket crash, Kearns was selling at levels between 200 c and 220 c a share. Kearns’ chairman, Mr Martin Coffey, said he was very relaxed about the company’s new shareholder.

“It is our hope that Duke will help us to expand Kearns — it is big enough to do so.” A Duke director, Mr Mervyll Reid, said Kearns complemented the Duke operation since that company mainly tailored itself for the wholesale market, while Kearns was involved in retailing. "Duke is a low profile unlisted public company looking for an opportunity to expand into New Zealand,” he said. "It came to our notice that a shareholding in Kearns might be available. Nothing has been settled yet, but we have got Commerce Commission and Overseas Investment Commission approval,” said Mr Reid.