The Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System is acquiring a 19.99 per cent stake in TransGrid, an Australian electricity infrastructure company.
The organization’s high-voltage transmission network connects around eight million people to the electricity supply. With a high proportion of regulated business making up about 90 per cent of its leased assets, TransGrid offers investors like the OMERS regulated revenue that’s a strong match for pension obligations, according to a press release, which also noted the company has contestable business that provides future growth opportunities to investors.
“We are pleased to become investors in TransGrid and be part of this forward-looking company’s further evolution,” said Ralph Berg, global head of infrastructure at the OMERS, in the release. “TransGrid is poised to both continue making a crucial contribution to Australia’s electricity needs, while also playing a key role in helping reduce carbon emissions from the country’s electricity grid.”
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With the investment, the OMERS joins a consortium of other investors in the company’s ownership group, including the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec.
“Today is a proud day for OMERS as TransGrid marks our second infrastructure investment in Australia, after the Port of Melbourne,” said Christopher Curtain, managing director for Australia at OMERS Infrastructure. “This announcement also represents an increasing role for OMERS in the growth and development of New South Wales, which includes the substantial investment being undertaken by OMERS-owned Oxford Properties in the Sydney Metro Pitt Street over-station development.”
In other investment news, the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board has invested further in Premium Brands Holdings Corp., which owns a broad range of food manufacturing and distribution businesses throughout the U.S.
At $86.30 per share, the CPPIB’s latest investment in 400,200 common shares comes to about $34.5 million. A four-month statutory hold period is in place for the common shares from the date of issue, subject to certain exempt trades permitted by applicable securities legislation.
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The company plans to use the influx of cash from the private placement, as well as a simultaneous public offering, to reduce indebtedness under one of its revolving credit facilities to increase available capital should strategic acquisition opportunities present themselves, according to a press release.
In May 2019, the company completed a private placement of 2,631,000 common shares to the CPPIB at a price of $76.02 per share. The price was based on a 1.5 per cent discount to the five-day volume-weighted average trading price of Premium Brands’ common shares as of closing on May 17, 2019.