The private equity backer of Blue Star parent IVE, Wolseley, has sold half its shares in the group, cashing in $35m worth of ownership, following the release of the company’s first results as a listed company, which saw forecasts exceeded across the board.
The sale leaves Wolseley with ownership of 18.9 per cent of the business, which listed on the ASX last December for $2 a share. Current price is $2.20, Wolseley sold for $2.10 to a number of investors in a block trade.
IVE says it welcomes the move, as it ‘improves the trading liquidity of the business and broadens the shareholder base’.
Following the move Ellerston Capital Limited has just purchased 7.61 per cent of the company in the form of 6,785,605 ordinary shares for almost $15m.
Ellerston says its investment strategy is to ‘focus on opportunities the market may have overlooked – exploiting inefficiencies by identifying stocks that are temporarily misunderstood and fundamentally mispriced’, indicating it believes there is significant upside to come in the IVE stock..
When IVE launched on the ASX in December the owners – Wolseley and the Selig family – sold 42.5 per cent of the company, raising $75.6m on the day at shares that launched at $2 a pop. Price today is ten per cent up on that, broadly in line with the All Ords movement since December.
The two parties had initially paid $22m for the Blue Star business in 2012, from the Champ p/e ownership. Champ had bought Blue Star for NZ$385m six years earlier.
Since they purchased Blue Star they have made multiple acquisitions in businesses, some printing, some in other related and non-related fields.
The diversified IVE Group now comprises Blue Star and three other divisions; IVEO, the managed print solutions business; creative agency Kalido; and fundraising business Pareto. Blue Star itself has developed rapidly from an offset print business to a broad print services provider including one of the country’s biggest display print operations, a promotional products business, a data driven digital print business, a logistics business, as well as heatset and sheetfed printing.
Wolseley first entered the print industry in 2000 when it took a stake in Stream Solutions, which at that time was a $10m business. When Wolseley made its exit seven years later it was a $120m business.
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