Ashford W. Meikle, Business Reporter

Mayberry's Oxford Road office, New Kingston. - file

Mayberry Investments Limited (MIL) will tap the market for new equity with a planned preference-share issue, the company's board decided Wednesday. The approval of shareholders is to be sought at Mayberry's June 15 annual general meeting.

The Chris Berry-led company, which is scouting for business deals, wants to be in a position to snag opportunities.

In a release to the Jamaica Stock Exchange, Mayberry announced that a special resolution would be considered at the AGM that will ask shareholders to approve the dividing of the company's authorised share capital into 2,120,000,000 ordinary shares [and] 380,000,000 redeemable cumulative preference shares."

Approve shares

Shareholders will also be asked to approve the company issuing and allotting of the preference shares out of the company's authorised capital.

Speaking on Friday with Sunday Business, MIL's chief executive officer, Gary Peart, said the company is positioning itself to seize opportunities as soon as there was a turnaround in the equities market.

"It's a function of timing. We are looking at the market and when the timing is right, we will issue those preference shares," said Peart. "We are setting the stage [so that] we can to put ourselves in a position that when the opportunities come up we have the appropriate money in place."

The CEO noted that issuing preference shares was common in sophisticated financial markets.

"What we are looking at is an established trend in the big markets. If you go to the United States, for example, this is how a lot of the financial services companies operate. You always want to find different and creative methods of funding your company."

'Innovative stuff'

According to Peart, Mayberry - with over $1 billion in equity - is one of the few securities dealers that is willing to put its capital into transactions.

Last year, for example, the company paid $38 million for a 49 per cent stake in Access Financial Services, a fledgling company founded six years ago by Marcus James, the son of former corporate group chairman and KLAS managing director, Neville James.

Peart declined to go into details, including the planned date for the issue, saying the company was simply laying the groundwork for a number of preference-shares issues which it will bring to the market.

"What I will say to you is that we just want to put ourselves in a position that when the time is right, we can issue it. There are certain niche markets and certain opportunities that we see. [And] what will happen over a period of time is that we might issue different types of preference-shares for different investments," he said. "It's one of Mayberry's ways of coming with innovative stuff."

ashford.meikel@gleanerjm.com