PPC – Green light from the General Assembly for share capital increase

With an overwhelming majority of over 99%, the body of PPC shareholders approved the increase of the company's share capital by 750 million euros and the sale of 232 million new shares.

At the same time, the extraordinary general meeting of shareholders approved the transfer of 49% of HEDNO to Maquarie a fund member company from Australia.

With the process starting at the end of October, the company is changing chapters while the public sector is expected to reduce its participation to 34%.

The president and CEO of the company, George Stassis, answering questions from shareholders why the management did not decide on full privatization to a strategic investor, pointed out: "It was not an option to sell the entire percentage of shares. Its further shareholding with the entry of a large number of investors and institutional investors enables the company to raise funds to finance its investment program and to follow an autonomous course. Regarding the management of the listed company after the increase of the share capital and the entry of investors, he added: "Greeks can manage PPC on an equal footing as they do in other European companies".

Historical opportunity

During the general meeting, the management of the company, answering questions from shareholders and explaining the benefits of the share capital increase, underlined, among other things, that "this is the financing of the company without additional borrowing or financing". He pointed out that "such opportunities are historic and occur extremely rarely in the history of a company. The share capital increase is the only transaction that does not burden the company's balance sheet with further borrowing ". He also emphasized the international economic environment and the...