GAUNAVOU Investment Company Ltd (GICL), whose portfolio heavily leans on property investments, has launched a share buyback offer to its shareholders at 16 cents a share, a cent above market price, as it advances towards a public listing on the South Pacific Stock Exchange (SPX).
In a public statement in local daily newspapers last week, the company said the voluntary share buyback scheme had been approved by its board where shareholders holding 30,000 GICL shares or less can sell all their shares back to the company while those holding more than 30,000 GICL shares can sell up to 10 per cent of their current holding back to the company.
“The board of GICL is proposing that a new Company constitution be approved and it is based on SPSE (SPX) recommended Constitutions for listed companies with minor amendments as required,” the company’s public notice stated.
“The Board and management will be seeking formal endorsement from shareholders on the new proposed Memorandum & Articles of Association that will ensure regulatory approval.”
Approval by majority of registered shareholders and those holding 75 per cent of issued shares at the company Extraordinary General Meeting will allow the company to proceed towards SPX-compliance, as listing on SPX has been the intention of the company for a while now, company secretary Rafaele Kasibulu said when contacted by this newspaper.
GICL is one of the three unlisted companies on the Central Share Registry, an SPX subsidiary that manages shareholder matters for companies both on SPX’s listed and unlisted platforms.
The offer price of 16 cents a share is being made above the current market price, which according to the company is 15 cents a share.
Mr Kasibulu told this newspaper the company’s listing on SPX is still a way away and is likely to happen in the next two years as GICL works on clearing compliance hurdles.
GICL was set up in 1993 by the Suva City Fijian Urban Constituency branch of then then active Soqosoqo ni Vakavulewa ni iTaukei (SVT) political party.
Among GICL’s founding members were current Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka, local businessman and merchant banker John Sanday and development banker the late Ratu Deve Toganivalu.
