Bonhill to fund final quarter with £2.5m raise at 5p
is to raise a minimum of £2.5m at 5p per share in order to fund the company’s working capital requirements through to the final quarter of 2020.
The AIM-listed media business told investors on Thursday that a placing would take place in two tranches, the first of up to 4.8m new ordinary shares, and the second a minimum of 45.1m.
The placing price represents a 23% discount to Bonhill’s closing share price of 6.5p on 8 April 2020.
It follows ‘significant disruption’ to events activity across the group’s four key communities - the UK, Europe, North America and Asia, - which accounted for around 40% of revenue, or £24.4m, at the end of 2019.
Meanwhile, Bonhill noted a surge of interest in its small business offering which is performing ahead of budget with 1.2m unique users in March compared to 181,000 in February.
Bonhill ran 16 events in 2020, but as the impact of COVID-19 has increased, this has scaled down, particularly in March, and it has no events scheduled until July 2020 at the earliest.
Shares in Bonhill Group were trading flat at 6.5p during Thursday morning.
Specifically, the events deferred to the second half were expected to generate total revenues of £5.0m, comprising around £1.8m in the US, £1.7m in the UK, £1.2m in Europe and £0.3m in Asia.
The group said it expects revenue of the group’s events business to be lowered by £5.2m and gross profit by £3.1m for the first half of the financial year as a result of the COVID-19.
However, it said it was taking actions to conserve cash, including the board suspending dividend payments until it receives a clearer outlook and more normal trading has resumed.
As at 20 March 2020, the Group had a total cash balance of £1.6m and a vendor loan of $3.1m repayable in monthly instalments until August 2021.
The company says its remaining events are currently expected to go ahead as planned in the third or fourth quarter 2020.
Follow News & Updates from Bonhill Group here:
Disclaimer & Declaration of Interest
The information, investment views and recommendations in this article are provided for general information purposes only. Nothing in this article should be construed as a solicitation to buy or sell any financial product relating to any companies under discussion or to engage in or refrain from doing so or engaging in any other transaction. Any opinions or comments are made to the best of the knowledge and belief of the writer but no responsibility is accepted for actions based on such opinions or comments. Vox Markets may receive payment from companies mentioned for enhanced profiling or publication presence. The writer may or may not hold investments in the companies under discussion.