Young’s pub chain taps investors for £88m ahead of pubs reopening
Young’s pub chain has raised more than £88m from its investors via a share placing ahead of the reopening of pubs from next week.
The firm said it had placed a total of 4,263,453 placing shares at 1,160p per share and 4.9m non-voting shares at 735p per share to raise £85.5m.
Young’s also raised a further £2.7m through retail investors.
The new shares represent approximately 19.2 per cent of the total existing issued ordinary share capital of Young’s prior to the placing.
Last month, the pub chain said it was in the process of securing an additional £100m to help it through the pandemic. It had raised £30m through the government’s Covid Corporate Financing Facility (CCFF).
In addition to the government support, Young’s raised £70m through bank lending – £a £50m syndicated term loan facility with Natwest and HSBC, and a new £20m revolving credit facility with Natwest.
At the time the firm said it was confident it had “sufficient liquidity to handle a prolonged period of closure of its pubs”. The majority of the workforce have been furloughed under the government’s job retention scheme, with just 29 employees still working through the pandemic.
Young’s closed all of its pub in late March after the government announced the UK would be under lockdown due to the coronavirus outbreak.
Young’s had previously said it was eyeing an August open date but earlier this week, the Prime Minister announced pubs could open from 4 July provided sufficient precautions are taken.