3i Cuts further Stake in Norma after Placing

UK private equity firm 3i sold €77 million (￡61 million) of shares in German engineering firm Norma Group to institutional investors on September 5 – taking its stake from 73 percent to 16.7 percent in just 18 months.

3i announced it had placed four million shares for a price of €19.25 per share with investors. The news prompted Norma to fall from €19.95 to €18.84 on the Frankfurt stock exchange. It ended the day at €19.

3i, which invests in mild market private equity, infrastructure and debt management, maintains it position as Norma’s biggest shareholder with an aggregate holding of 16.7 percent. It floated Norma onto the market last April with a €669 million market cap, taking its share in the company down from 73 percent to 31 percent – a 46 percent reduction. The latest move follows the same trend and reduces its ownership of the company by a further 46 percent.

Norma was formed in 2006 through the merger of German firm Rasmussen Group and the Swedish company ABA Group. (source: CityAM.com)