The BlackRock Greater Europe Investment Trust (BRGE), which has been granted a fast-tracked listing on the JSE, will be raising more capital from investors than expected because of rand weakness in the wake of Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba’s recent medium-term budget policy statement. The prelisting statement released by the subsidiary of the world’s largest asset manager on Friday showed the trust — which has investments in European blue chips Unilever, Volvo, Renault and Bayer — planned to raise about £35.5m (R670m), rather than the R650m BlackRock MD for closed funds Simon White had told Business Day it planned to raise. "As the primary listing share price is trading in [pounds] and the shares are issued at a [pound net asset value], rand weakness will result in the total quantum being raised in rand increasing," White said on Friday. The rand has slumped nearly 4% to R18.7694 against the pound since BlackRock’s announcement in October that its megafund would take a secondary li...
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