South Canterbury Finance to get additional equity from Kerr

Thursday 20th May 2010

South Canterbury Finance's parent company is getting an additional $15.5 million equity injection from George Kerr's Torchlight Fund.

Torchlight has confirmed that it will take up an option to increase its investment in Southbury Corporation which will enable additional equity to be injected into South Canterbury Finance Limited.

Torchlight will increase its investment in Southbury by a further $15.5 million which, in addition to the $22 million investment already announced, will increase the total investment to $37.5 million.

The deal requires approval from South Canterbury Finance's trustee, the Crown and existing Southbury noteholders.

The investment will be subscribed in full on May 31 and in turn Southbury will invest the same dollar value in cash into new ordinary shares in South Canterbury Finance on the same day.

South Canterbury Finance will guarantee the redemption by Southbury of the securities issued to Torchlight Fund and will grant a prior ranking charge over its assets in support of the guarantee. In addition, Southbury will indemnify South Canterbury Finance for any payments required to be made under the guarantee.

South Canterbury Finance chairman Allan Hubbard says the additional funds subscribed by Torchlight Fund are a further endorsement of the repositioning of the business in the last six months.

"Strategically, South Canterbury Finance is one of only a handful of finance companies with the ability to provide funds for business growth and development beyond the traditional banking sector."

Torchlight Fund chairman George Kerr says the fund is committed to working with Southbury to assist South Canterbury Finance to execute its strategy of moving towards three distinct business groups being firstly, traditional finance, secondly, private equity and thirdly, real estate and asset management assets.

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