[ad_1]
Tui, the world’s largest package vacation operator, plans to raise € 1.1 billion by selling new shares after demand surged over the summer.
The Anglo-German group announced Wednesday that it would sell more than 523 million new shares at a price of 2.15 euros each, a discount of 35% compared to its share price.
The share issue will bring its liquidity and available facilities to € 4.5 billion and help repay the more than € 4 billion in state-guaranteed loans it has contracted with the government German as the Covid-19 crisis devastated the travel industry.
“We want to, we can and will return to the path of economic strength. We are working tirelessly on this, ”said Managing Director Friedrich Joussen.
Tui said its largest shareholder Unifirm, which is controlled by the family of billionaire Russian steel magnate Alexei Mordashov, has chosen to exercise all of its subscription rights. Unifirm has an approximate 32 percent stake in the company.
“The offer will allow us to take a significant step forward, increasing our ability to take advantage of business opportunities resulting from the relaxation of restrictions on Covid-19,” Joussen added. “This will provide us with a more appropriate capital structure under more normal operating conditions.”
Travel to Europe and the United States slowly opened up over the summer as vaccination rates increased, allowing hard-hit travel agencies to capitalize on some of the latent demand for international vacations.
Tui said he took 5.2 million vacation bookings this summer, about 1.1 million more than he had in the third quarter update two months ago. More than 2.6 million people traveled with the group in July and August, double the number of customers in the same two months last year, he added.
The company added that winter bookings in the UK, where testing and quarantine restrictions had been stricter than in the rest of Europe, had been “trending strongly” since the government relaxed the rules. travel September 17.
Tui said he expected summer 2022 to “likely recover near normalized summer 2019 levels,” but James Ainley, analyst at Citi, warned that so far the group has booked less than 20% of its expected capacity for the summit next year. season.
Ainley said Tui would need to see “further improvements in the business” or raise more capital to meet his leverage target of three times earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization.
Source link
