$6.95 much for Sagicor X fund rights

Sagicor Real Estate X Fund rights issue is priced at J$6.95 per share, 50 cents higher than the net book value of $6.55. The issue a non-renounceable for up to 598,134,700 new ordinary shares on the basis of two new shares for every five units held as at August 17 2015.
The stock closed at $8.50 on the Jamaica Stock Exchange on Friday August 7th with 34,000 shares changing hands. The closing date for the issue is September 2, 2015, with the opening on August 19. The gross funds expected to be raised is J$4,157,036,165 and are intended to be used to assist Fund to acquire a convention hotel in Orlando, Florida, which is affiliated with a major hotel chain. The rights issue document states that the “resort has 742 rooms with over 62,800 square feet of meeting and convention space. It is located in Orlando at the entrance to the Universal Theme Park. The balance of the purchase price is expected to be funded by way of a loan”.
Sagicor Pooled Diversified Investment Fund and other connected Sagicor entities which together own approximately 80% of the stock units of the Company have stated that they intend to take up all their Rights. Shareholders who do not take up any of their Rights will be diluted by 28.57% assuming that all the Rights Shares are taken up and the Rights Issue is not up-sized.
The Fund reserves the right, in the event of over-subscription for shares from the Un-allocated Pool to upsize the Rights Issue by releasing up to maximum of 149,533,675 shares into the Un-allocated Pool to meet demand from its shareholders. X Fund does not intend to up-size the Rights Issue beyond the aforesaid maximum. If the Rights Issue is up-sized to the maximum the issued share capital of the Company would be increased by 50% over the current amount of shares in issue of 1,495,336,750 stock units and a shareholder who did not take up any of his Rights Shares would be diluted by 33⅓%.
Buoyed by an abnormal first quarter results, earnings ended at 46 cents per share to June versus 27 cents for the six months to June last year. Unfortunately, the rights issue document fails to indicate what income and profit is expected from the property being acquired nor what the forecast is for the rest of 2015 for the overall operations, to allow investors an insight into what is to be expected.
The stock which is overvalued is unlikely to enjoy the generation of profits in the short run from ongoing operations to justify the price being asked. In a market where few stocks are selling at a premium to net asset value, it is difficult to see why rational investors would want to pay a premium to the market for such an investment and suffer later the prospects of disappointing earnings that will justify the price either. One only has to look at Proven Investments shares, where investors gobbled up the stock at inflated prices as high as 22 US cents only to see few buyers for it now at 18 US cents to realise that hype will often will out in the short run but reality sets in after.
Investors should know what they are buying but that is not clear from the offer document but Sagicor Group selling at a PE of 6-7 times this year’s earnings with a book value of $12.17 versus last traded price of $13 is a far better buy. The issue is taking place in a bull market so who knows what will happen?