Aristocrat Leisure Limited, the Australian developer of casino slot machines and digital games, has announced it has successfully raised the 1.3 billion Australian dollars it needs in order to acquire Playtech, the international developer of video slots and live dealer games.
The Australian company completed a retail entitlement offer to raise the respective funds, three weeks after an institutional entitlement offer raised an additional 895 million Australian dollars towards the Playtech purchase. The retail component added another 405 million Australian dollars as 9.7 million Aristocrat shares were issued at a price of 41.85 dollars per share.
Aristocrat revealed on 18 October that it had made an offer to acquire Playtech for 3.9 billion Australian dollars. At the time, the Australian company announced that it had 1.1 billion dollars in cash and that the remaining funds would be raised through a long-term loan and through equity raising.
Aristocrat also revealed that it had already convinced some of Playtech’s shareholders to accept the offer. The Australian company revealed that it has received letters of intent or irrevocable undertakings from shareholders representing 20.7 percent of the total outstanding shares of Playtech.
The Playtech board of directors have also found the offer appealing, recommending the remaining shareholders to vote in favour of the acquisition deal. The offer from Aristocrat is worth 680 pence per share, 58 percent more than the closing price on the stock market on 15 October, which was 429 pence per share.
