To The Moon

SATS has finally released details on their rights issue, which they had been speaking of for months, to raise a significant amount of funds.

First of all, the rights price is set at S$2.20. It means that you need to pay this amount to get each additional share.

The allotment is 323 Rights Shares for every 1,000 shares you own. If you indeed have 1,000 shares, you would need to make a payment of S$710.60 (323 x S$2.20) to get your full entitlement.

It's worth noting that subscribing to the full allotment of 323 Rights Shares may result in odd lots of 23 shares, which can be difficult to trade and may incur additional fees - lot size is in multiple of 100s.

A possible solution is to subscribe to 300 Rights Shares, forfeiting the remaining 23 shares. This approach would result in a round lot of shares and avoid the potential difficulties associated with odd lots.

Another option is to subscribe to 400 Rights Shares, which would result in an excess allocation of 77 shares.

However, it's important to note that the excess allocation of 77 shares isn't guaranteed, and is subject to the availability of shares not subscribed for by other shareholders.

Therefore, you may still end up with odd lots should you not be allotted the full 77 shares eventually.

The third way is to sell all or some of your Rights Shares in the open market. This is possible because SATS have made this rights issue a renounceable one.

In the coming weeks, there will be a SATS counter labelled with an "R" - something along the lines of "SATS R" to indicate that this is the Rights Shares that are trading.

You can sell the Rights Shares like normal shares and trading commissions will apply.

However, you might not be able to sell because there may not be enough buyers. You will still end up with the Rights Shares.

The fourth way is to do nothing and forfeit your entitlement.

But SATS is still going to get the money and complete the acquisition without you.

This is because Temasek, via its subsidiary Venezio, will subscribe all its entitled Rights Shares, which is around 39.68% of the full issue.

The remaining 60.32% have been underwritten and that means that the financiers for this deal, namely, DBS, BofA, Citi, OCBC and UOB will collectively provide the funding even if there are no takers for the Rights Shares.

SATS will go ahead as planned regardless how this Rights Issue turns out. It is just asking if you wish to get onboard.

With regards to any rights issue, my thinking is always binary.

It makes sense to subscribe to the Rights otherwise your percentage ownership in the company will fall (that's what dilution means.)

If you choose not to subscribe because you don't buy into this acquisition or the future of the company, you should not only give up the Rights Shares, but also consider selling all the shares of the company.

You have to take a side.

Decide quick because the share price will drop on 1 March 2023 when it goes "ex-rights".

$SATS LTD.(S58.SI)$