Egypt's Edita to list 30 pct of ordinary shares in secondary offering

CAIRO (Reuters) - Egyptian foodmaker Edita said on Monday it would put up to 30 percent of its ordinary shares on the Egyptian stock market in a secondary public offering. The company is making a combined offering that includes an institutional offering of ordinary shares on the Egyptian bourse and global depository receipts (GDRs) to be listed in London. There would also be a separate domestic offering of ordinary shares, it said in a statement. "Edita has received permission to list its shares on the EGX (bourse) under the symbol EFID.CA," the company said. It added that shareholders were meeting to approve the combined offering. Market sources later told Reuters on Monday that the firm would seek to raise 2 billion Egyptian pounds ($262 million) in the initial offering on the Cairo bourse. The sources said trading was expected to start from early April. Edita has a capital of 72.536 million pounds, divided into 362,681,000 shares, with a nominal value of 0.20 pounds per share. The Edita offering is part of a flurry of mergers and rights issues that has boosted activity on the Cairo exchange, which had struggled to win investor confidence during four years of political and economic turmoil since the Arab Spring uprising. Egypt's government launched last year a raft of long-delayed reforms aimed at luring back foreign investors and shoring up growth while cutting a ballooning deficit. Food is seen as a fast-growing sector in the most populous Arab nation of 87 million people. Kellogg won a takeover battle in January to secure a controlling stake in Egyptian cake and biscuit maker Bisco Misr, while Europe's biggest dairy group, Lactalis, is competing with Egypt's Pioneers Holding for cheese maker Arab Dairy. Edita is being advised by Goldman Sachs and EFG Hermes. The shareholders selling stakes in Edita are Africa Samba B.V. and Exoder Limited, the statement said. ($1 = 7.6300 Egyptian pounds) (Reporting By Shadi Bushra and Ehab Farouk; Editing by Rosalind Russell and Prateek Chatterjee)