Australian miner Rio Tinto, the world's second largest iron ore producer, has revealed that it has sold 100 percent of its London-listed shares on offer under the US$15.2 billion rights issue aimed at reducing its debt.
According to the July 1 statement released by the company to the Australian stock exchange, Rio Tinto sold 96.97 percent of the shares i.e. 508.6 million shares at the close of the offer at 11 a.m. London time on July 1.
Later on July 2, Rio Tinto released another statement confirming that purchasers have been procured by the underwriters of the share sale for the remaining 15.9 million rights issues.
It is expected that the results of the Rio Tinto Limited Rights Issue, which are not yet available, will be announced on Friday, July 3.
As SteelOrbis previously reported, Rio Tinto scrapped a US$19.5 billion investment proposal from its biggest shareholder China's state-owned aluminum giant Aluminum Corp. of China (Chinalco) on June 5 and instead opted to launch a US$15.2 billion dollar rights issue to allow the company to solve its debt problems and to establish an iron ore joint venture with BHP Billiton Ltd.
Meanwhile, Chinalco has confirmed its purchase of US$1.5 billion of Rio Tinto shares to secure its 9.3 percent shareholding in the miner; otherwise, its shareholding in the miner would have decreased from 9.3 percent to about six percent.
Commenting on the share purchase, Chinalco said, "This was an economically rational decision as it prevented the dilution of our ownership in Rio Tinto. Chinalco will, as the company's current largest single shareholder, continue to monitor developments at Rio Tinto."
Credit Suisse Group AG, JPMorgan Cazenove Ltd., Deutsche Bank AG, Morgan Stanley and Macquarie Capital Ltd. are the joint global managers of the rights offer.