Prosus N.V., led by South African billionaire Koos Bekker, announces share buy-back worth $118.5 million

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Prosus N.V., a global internet group led by South African billionaire Koos Bekker, has announced the successful buy-back of its shares worth $118.5 million. 

The Dutch multinational conglomerate repurchased 1,507,243 ordinary shares at an average price of €69.6075 per share for a total consideration of €104,915,418.70 ($118,544,498.01). 

The transaction occurred on Dec. 20-24. 

Founded in 1997, Prosus N.V. is a global consumer Internet group and one of the largest technology investors in the world. It holds a portfolio of investments in leading international fintech, social Internet, ed-tech and food delivery system companies. 

Prosus N.V. operates as a subsidiary of Naspers, a leading South African multinational group led by Bekker. 

Earlier in August, Prosus N.V. announced plans to launch an on-market buy-back of shares from its free-float shareholders for a total consideration of up to $5 billion from its free-float.  

The move follows a voluntary share exchange exercise between the ordinary shareholders of Prosus N.V. and its parent company, Naspers, which was completed on Aug. 16. 

To effectively implement the buy-back exercise, Prosus N.V. appointed an intermediary and gave it the liberty to execute the initiative during open and closed periods. During closed periods, the intermediary will make its trading decisions independently from, and uninfluenced by, Prosus. 

The initiative, which started on Aug. 23, will end on or before Aug. 19, 2022, depending on if the maximum consideration under the program was attained.

The total consideration includes costs and related taxes.  

Prosus N.V. intends to cancel the ordinary shares that it repurchased under the program in due course, so as to reduce its issued share capital. 

Prosus N.V. earlier reported a 424-percent surge in its bottom-line to $15.8 billion in the first half of its 2022 financial year. Its top line also grew by 31 percent year-on-year to $16.63 billion. The surge in earnings was spurred by the sale of its holdings in the Chinese-backed Internet group, Tencent. 

As of press time,. Dec. 30, shares in Prosus were worth €71.27, up 0.87 percent from their opening price this morning on the Amsterdam Stock Exchange.