United Malt, the world's fourth-largest independent commercial maltster following its recent demerger from GrainCorp will raise approximately $165 million.

The capital raise is a significant milestone as United Malt deals with market uncertainty caused by COVID-19. The proceeds from the raising will allow United Malt to pre-emptively strengthen its balance sheet and provide increased operational flexibility to explore investment opportunities and execute strategic objectives.

As a newly listed company, United Malt required novel relief from ASIC, which along with the need to time the transaction with the release of GrainCorp’s half-yearly financial results (due to those containing disclosure about United Malt for the same period) as well as the expedited timetable made for a complex transaction.

John Williamson-Noble and Adam D’Andreti, the Corporate Advisory partners who led the transaction commented, “we were delighted to assist United Malt on this strategically important deal amid these challenging times. It was really pleasing to be able to assist United Malt on its first major transaction as a standalone company and to use our market leading ECM experience to help United Malt and its underwriter, Macquarie Capital, achieve their commercial objective”.

They were supported by Corporate Advisory lawyers Chris Morse, Michael Tong, Cassie Bell and David Konstantopoulos.

G+T’s market-leading Equity Capital Markets team has advised on many of Australia’s largest and most innovative transactions, including recently advising on Ramsay Health Care’s $1.2 billion placement and share purchase plan, Newcrest Mining’s $1 billion placement and share purchase plan and Cochlear’s $880 million placement and share purchase plan. The team is ranked Band 1 by Chambers and all other key legal directories.  In 2019 Bloomberg ranked us 1st in Australia/NZ by number of deals as legal advisor to the issuer and both Bloomberg and Refinitiv ranked us 1st in Australia/NZ by number of deals as legal advisor to the manager.