Super Retail Group completed the acquisition of Rebel Group for Austrailian $610 million. Rebel has 128 stores, including 92 Rebel Sport outlets and 36 Amart All sports shops.
Super Retail's acquisition of Rebel from Archer Capital will be funded by A$296 million of debt and a A$334 million nine-for-19 accelerated retail tradeable entitlement offer.
The A$284 million institutional placement was completed last month, and the retail entitlement offer to raise $50m will remain open until November 16.
Under the entitlement offer, shareholders will be able to purchase nine new shares for every 19 existing Super Retail Group ordinary shares held on the record date of October 20 this year.
The offer price of A$5.34 per new share represents a 17.8 per cent discount to the closing market share price on October 14 and a 12.8 per cent per cent discount to the theoretical ex-rights price (TERP). SRG chief executive Peter Birtles also announced the company had appointed a former Rebel general manager, Erica Berchtold, to become the managing director of sports retailing to help drive sales and develop its brands.
Berchtold is currently working as general manager at Speciality Fashion Group.
Birtles said: “The acquisition represents a fantastic opportunity for the group to leverage its retail and supply expertise and to build Rebel's position as the national leader in sporting goods retailing.
“A key focus of the business is to establish a plan for driving like-for-like sales. To achieve this, it is important to have a strong team in place across the Super Retail Group to build and develop our brands.”
