The listing of Salrom will take place through a public offer carried out by Fondul Proprietatea through the sale of its 49% holding in the company.
On March 31, 2022, Fondul Proprietatea held 49% of the share capital of Salrom (2.01 million shares), an ownership put at RON216.7 million and representing almost 1.5% of the net assets of Fondul Proprietatea. This is the seventh largest holding in FP portfolio.
Based on a competitive selection process, Fondul Proprietatea selected BRD – Groupe Société Générale as Investment Bank to coordinate the transaction.
“We would like to extend our thanks to the Ministry of Economy for the strong collaboration throughout this process. We are excited to witness this positive development, which is a key step in the listing process and brings us closer to the listing itself. We would like to complete the listing of Salrom on the Bucharest Stock Exchange in the first half of 2023, thus increasing the number of major issuers listed on the main market,” stated Johan Meyer, CEO of Franklin Templeton Investments Romania and Portfolio Manager of Fondul Proprietatea.
The approval of the memorandum comes as a subsequent step following the approval in principle for the listing of Salrom through a public offer carried out by Fondul Proprietatea at the company’s general shareholder meeting in July 2021.
The Romanian State, through the Ministry of Economy does not intend to participate in the listing process by selling shares and will remain the majority stakeholder of the company, with a 51% ownership stake.
“Listing Salrom would create liquidity for the Fund, in line with its current investment strategy to realize value from investee companies and increase liquidity within the Fund portfolio. It would also create an additional, unique opportunity for investors on the Bucharest Stock Exchange and would support the further development of the local capital market”, Franklin Templeton said in a statement.
With an average number of 1,437 employees on December 31, 2021, Salrom ended 2022 with a net profit of RON60.2 million, up 423.5% on the year, and an operating income of RON374.5 million, up 24.8% on the year, in line with calculations by Ziarul Financiar (ZF) daily based on data from the Q1/2022 report of Fondul Proprietatea.
For 2022, Salrom targets a net profit of RON66.2 million, an operating profit of RON74.2 million (versus RON27.4 million in 2021) and an operating income of RON425.8 million. In terms of percentages, the profit is expected to increase by almost 10% and revenues by 23.4%, as per ZF calculations.
Fondul Proprietatea has a market capitalization of RON12.7 billion and its shareholders include, among others, The Bank of New York Mellon (16.4%) and private pension fund NN Pensii (10.56%).