Summerset shareholder Quadrant promises exit will be 'orderly'

Tuesday 30th April 2013

Summerset Group shareholder Quadrant Private Equity has promised an orderly exit from the retirement village operator if and when it decides to sell its 37.2 percent stake.

Managing director Chris Hadley, who sits on the Summerset board, told shareholders in Wellington that he couldn't spell out his firm's "intentions of the timing of the sell down or holding" in the company, but if they do sell down it will be done in a "very sensible fashion."

"In selling down, or an intention to sell down, our primary concern is to make sure we do that in an orderly fashion," Hadley said. "I can't give you any confidence in how long we will hold our shareholding, and since we're out of escrow we're an ordinary shareholder and retain our flexibility."

Last month, Quadrant sold 40 million shares at $2.42 apiece, or $96.8 million, after the escrow period requiring it to keep its majority stake ended in February. That sale left Quadrant with 80.76 million shares, worth $247.9 million at today's share price of $3.07.

Hadley said "the investment in Summerset has been a long-term one and a very successful one."

Quadrant floated Summerset on the NZX in 2011, raising $123.6 million, made up of a partial sell-down and a primary capital raising of $50 million.

The Australian private equity firm completed its full takeover of Summerset in 2010, buying the 50 percent it didn't own from fund manager AMP Capital Investors New Zealand.

AMP Capital sold up after it failed to get the retirement village operator away in a public float in 2007. Quadrant came on board in 2008, investing A$90.5 million of a A$500 million private equity fund.

Quadrant successfully floated Kathmandu Holdings on the NZX and ASX in 2009, raising A$375 million for the first float on the New Zealand exchange after a 22-month drought.

BusinessDesk.co.nz

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