By Emma-Victoria Farr, Lucy Raitano and Christoph Steitz
FRANKFURT/LONDON (Reuters) -Siemens Energy raised 1.259 billion euros ($1.33 billion) via the sale of new shares to help fund its takeover of wind turbine maker Siemens Gamesa.
Siemens Energy in November launched a bid for the remaining stake it did not already own in Siemens Gamesa, frustrated by a number of profit warnings at the division that had become a problem for its parent as well.
To help fund the 4.05 billion euro bid, Siemens Energy sold around 72.7 million new shares to institutional investors at 17.32 euros apiece, it said, equating to a discount of 5% to Wednesday's closing price.
Siemens Energy shares were up 1.8% following the share sale on Thursday.
"We are very pleased to see that institutional investors, amongst others ... are confident in our strategy to become the leader in the energy transition," Siemens Energy Chief Financial Officer Maria Ferraro said.
"The capital increase was almost four times covered. The successful placement of new shares is an important milestone in the refinancing of our cash tender offer for Siemens Gamesa and supports our solid investment grade credit rating," she added.
A spokesperson for Siemens Energy said that BNP Paribas (EPA:BNPP) Energy Transition Fund had subscribed to around 10% of the new shares, translating into a stake of 0.9% in Siemens Energy.
Major shareholder Siemens, which has repeatedly ruled out investing further capital in Siemens Energy, said its direct stake was diluted to 32% from 35%.
The share sale means that Siemens Energy's share capital will be increased by 10% through the issuing of the new shares, which carry full dividend rights for the current fiscal year.
Citigroup (NYSE:C) and SocGen acted as joint global coordinators on the deal alongside joint bookrunners UniCredit (LON:0RLS) in cooperation with Kepler Cheuvreux and HSBC (LON:HSBA).
($1 = 0.9455 euros)