Trading in oil services’ firm halted after investors shun heavily discounted share issue
Investment banks, led by JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs, have been left with €427m (£331m) of unwanted shares in Italian oil services company Saipem following the closure of its €3.5bn rights issue, after the largest financing of its type so far this year ran into trouble.
Shares in the group continued their vertiginous decline on Friday and trading had to be halted on the Milan exchange, after disclosure late last night that more than 12% of the heavily discounted share issue had been shunned by the group’s disgruntled investors.