Big Deals

The Lowy family have taken profits worth almost $27 million, selling shares in Westfield Group (WDC) just days before announcing a $3 billion wholesale fund that aims to shore up the share price of the giant listed property trust.
Frank Lowy and his sons David, Steven and Peter each sold 383,220 shares in Westfield for $17.51 each. Westfield has been trading between $15 and $18 for the past two years. The trade, which was conducted on market, will net the sellers $6.71 million each or a total close to $27 million. The transaction leaves the Lowy men with more than 166 million shares in the company each.

Also in property trusts, UBS Nominees has increased its holding Galileo Shopping America Trust (GSA) from 13.8% to 14.8%. The transaction consisted of the purchase of 9.7 million shares at $1.13 each, for a total of $11 million.

Some sizeable transactions in the fast-moving consumer goods distributor Metcash (MTS) should be of interest to investors and industry analysts alike. Lazard Asset Management announced to the ASX on July 10 that it had bought $35 million worth of the company, increasing its holding from 5.9% to 7.1%. On the same day, Deutsche Bank announced it had offloaded $53 million of the stock, reducing its holding from 8.9% to 7%.

Fairfax chief executive David Kirk has also made a timely share purchase. As part of Fairfax’s employee share plan, he bought 108,000 shares for $400,000 on July 3. The shares in John Fairfax Holdings (FXJ) were bought for $3.70 and at the close of trade yesterday were changing hands for $4.13, an increase of more than 9% over eight trading days, increasing the parcel’s value by a handy $36,000.

AXA Asia Pacific, the $10 billion diversified financial group, has gone short in Rinker (RIN), selling $7.7 million worth of the US building materials company. In reducing its holding from 46.5 million to 43 million shares, it no longer holds more than 5% of the company and therefore is no longer considered a majority shareholder.

Fund manager Maple-Brown Abbott showed some intestinal fortitude when it extended itself to purchasing 1.7 million shares in Ansell (ANN), increasing its holding in the stock from 9.2% to 10.4% for $15 million. Stock in Ansell plummeted on June 4 after the industrial released two profit warnings on consecutive days. The stock was purchased by Maple-Brown Abbott between June 29 and July 7.

As mentioned in previous weeks, privately held global funds manager Fidelity International has been active in the Australian market of late. Most recently, it purchased $2.5 worth of Biota Holdings (BTA) one week after the US Department of Health and Human Services announced it would stockpile a further 12 million courses of it flu drug Relenza. Separately, the group sold about a million shares in Colorado (CDO) for $4.28 a share, netting $4.2 million.

One group showing a bit more faith in the Australian retail sector is Hyperion Asset Management, which announced to the ASX on July 7 that it had embarked on a $12 million buying splurge. Included in the shopping spree were $8 million worth of shares in JB Hi-Fi (JBH) and $4 million worth of Fantastic Furniture (FAN).

Correction (July 19): The shares sold by the Lowy family were in fact part of the Westfield Superannuation Fund. The directors of Westfield did sell their own shares and hold 166 million shares between them, not each as reported.