Investment house Washington H. Soul Pattinson and Co. Ltd (ASX: SOL) is making a move to strengthen its balance sheet.
What’s happening?
WHSP said that it has successfully priced AU$225 million of unsecured senior convertible notes, due 2026. The company said that the notes received strong interest from eligible investors globally and priced at a coupon rate of 0.625% per annum, with a conversion premium of 25%.
At the same time of the offering, a delta placement was executed to facilitate some of the hedging activity by eligible investors in the notes. It was done at a clearing price of $27.99 per share, representing a discount of 3.5% to the last closing price, which was used as the reference share price for the notes.
What is WHSP going to use the money for?
The investment house said it intends to use the majority of the net proceeds to repay approximately $200 million of existing financial indebtedness which will lower WHSP’s average cost of debt and increase WHSP’s debt maturity profile. The remaining proceeds will be applied to further strengthen WHSP’s liquidity position.
WHSP said that it will continue to have low gearing and diversified sources of funding after the offering.
My thoughts on this
Being able to get funding at a cost of just 0.625% is really low (and good) for a business on the ASX. I think it makes sense to pay off debt, and lengthen the maturity, whilst interest rates are so low and the WHSP share price is high.
Does this move mean that WHSP intends to keep the debt level low, or is it planning to borrow to invest in other assets? Time will tell. As a shareholder I’d be supportive of borrowing at very cheap rates to invest in long term, good investments as long as the debt burden remained low.
As I’ve said in the past, I think WHSP is a really good quality, long term business. It’s the type of ASX share that I can see myself owning for the rest of my life. It has already been around for over a century. However, at this share price of around $28 (and above) it’s not cheap. I thought it was very good value under $20.
There are other ASX dividend shares that I like such as Brickworks Limited (ASX: BKW) and MFF Capital Investments Ltd (ASX: MFF), which look better value to me.
