Burford Capital (BUR) closed its retail bond issue two weeks early - and just eight days after it was launched. The issue raised £90m gross, or £88.9m after fees, far more than the £50-75m initially mooted. The company will pay 6.5 per cent of the capital a year in coupons to its new bondholders, which works out at about £5.9m.
IC TIP:
Buy
at
120p
The fund-raising is something of a coup for the specialist finance company, which provides finance for litigation. It is the first Aim-listed company to raise money through a retail bond, and possibly the smallest company to do so. Burford has no bank debt and at the December year-end had $58m (£34m) of cash. The £90m retail bond therefore brings its net debt to about a quarter of net assets ($352m at the year-end).
