Countrywide shareholders are to get a £20m boost thanks to the agency group's sale of some of its shares in the Zoopla Property Group.
An announcement from Countrywide says that following the recent sale of Zoopla Property Group PLC ordinary shares by Countywide in the Zoopla IPO, Countrywide will pay a special dividend of £20 million to return the cash proceeds to shareholders.
Countrywide's board has recommended that the special dividend of 9p per share will be paid along with the interim dividend for 2014 - this is scheduled for payment on September 15 to all those shareholders listed on August 15.
Countrywide also says it will make an announcement about its long-term divided policy when it releases its interim group results on July 31.
Countrywide's close links with Zoopla began in 2010 when - alongside LSL Property Services and Connells Group - it announced a long-term strategic partnership. ZPG's floatation earlier this month has been considered a success by the volatile recent record of other IPOs - initial public offerings.
A student accommodation fund, Brandeaux, was scheduled to float one of its operating subsidiaries - Liberty Living - in the very near future but this has now been cancelled; it is one of several IPOs to be marked down or withdrawn in recent months.
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Comments
....not bad for Countrywide seeing as they NEVER paid a single penny for the shares. Zoopla gave FREE shares to Countrywide (6.4%), Connells (5%) and LSL (5%) for FREE to gain their support.
I know because I worked at that Zoopla at the time.
The irony is, is that Countrywide, Connells and LSL have made more money on their FREE shareholding in Zoopla than they did with their original Rightmove shareholding!
Now, once Countrywide, Connells and LSL have cashed out all their shares, they will then be looking to set up another portal and repeat the process and then slag off Zoopla.
Its the free Portal ATM that keeps on giving!
Makes me wish I was a Countrywide shareholder! But I wonder if it was wise of countrywide to sell those shares, seeing as zoopla's IPO succeeded where many failed.