Seprod Limited will ask shareholders to approve a five-for-one stock split and a near doubling of its authorised shares, a move that would let the company issue new stock or raise fresh capital.
The company will hold an extraordinary general meeting on October 12, according to a release. Shareholders will vote on three resolutions. The first would raise the number of authorised shares from 1.0 billion to 1.9 billion. The second would subdivide each share into five, lifting the authorised total to 9.5 billion units. The third would give the board authority “to issue new shares in future, including through an additional public offer”.
Authorised shares cap the number of shares a company can issue. Seprod has 910.9 million shares in issue against its current 1.0 billion limit, leaving room for only about 89 million more.
The authorised split implies a corresponding split of the 910.9 million shares already in issue, which would become about 4.55 billion units, but Seprod did not confirm this by press time.
Seprod last raised its authorised shares in 2023, from 780 million to 1.0 billion, when it had 733.5 million shares in issue. It later used that headroom to buy out minority shareholders in AS Bryden & Sons Holdings, its Trinidad-based distribution subsidiary. Seprod paid for that deal by issuing new Seprod shares to AS Bryden shareholders, which lifted its share count to the current 910.9 million. An earlier increase in 2018, from 530 million to 780 million shares, financed the acquisition of Facey Consumer.
Any additional public offer would draw on the unissued shares below the new 9.5 billion limit. Together with the board’s authority to issue shares, the proposals would give Seprod room to raise equity for acquisitions, expansion or debt reduction without returning to shareholders for approval each time.
A stock split leaves a company’s underlying value unchanged, but a lower unit price often makes shares more affordable and can deepen trading. On Tuesday’s close of $72.14, a five-for-one split would put Seprod’s stock at about $14.43.
For the six months to June 2026, Seprod’s revenue slipped three per cent to $72.93 billion, down from $75.18 billion, as tourism-sector demand weakened after disruptions linked to Hurricane Melissa. Net profit, however, jumped 62 per cent to $2.34 billion on stronger operations, tighter cost control and a gain on the sale of International Biscuits Limited. Earnings per share rose to $2.59 from $1.27 a year earlier, and stockholders’ equity climbed to $50.52 billion. The group also cut debt by more than $3 billion during the period.
At a market capitalisation of about $65.7 billion, Seprod ranks among the largest manufacturers on the Jamaica Stock Exchange. Yet, it has fewer shares in issue than some of its peers. Wisynco Group, valued at $78.4 billion, has 3.8 billion shares outstanding, and LASCO Manufacturing, valued at $31 billion, has 4.15 billion. GraceKennedy, by contrast, has 988 million shares and has for more than a decade resisted calls from individual shareholders to split its stock.
neville.graham@gleanerjm.com
