Thursday, May 7, 2009

Simon Property Raises $23M In Secondary Offering

Simon Property Group Inc (SPG.N), the largest U.S. mall owner and operator, raised the amount of shares it will sell under its second stock offering in less than two months and priced them at $50 per share.
Simon on Thursday said it would offer 20 million shares and 3 million more shares to cover overallotments. That's up from 14 million shares and a 2.1 million share overallotment announced on Wednesday.
Shares of Simon Thursday morning traded at $50.83, down $4.01, or 7 percent, on the New York Stock Exchange.
Simon, which has interest in more than 386 malls, shopping centers and outlet centers, in North America, Europe and Asia, said it would use its for general corporate purposes.
In March, Simon sold a total of 17.25 million shares at $31.50 per share and offered $650 million in notes, raising net proceeds of $1.2 billion.
Earlier this month, Indianapolis, Indiana-based Simon said it ended the first quarter with $1.1 billion of cash on hand and had access to more than $3 billion under its revolving credit facility.
One of Simon's chief rivals, General Growth Properties Inc(GGWPQ.PK), last month filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, and investors and analysts have speculated whether Simon is accumulating a pile of cash to use to acquire some of General Growth's Properties that could come up for sale.
However, Simon Executives have said that the timing is too early and that the company is being conservative with its cash as it wades through the credit crunch.
Merrill Lynch, JPMorgan and Morgan Stanley were joint book runners for Simon.

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