The Wide Open Agriculture Ltd (ASX: WOA) share price has charged out of a trading halt today, rallying as much as 30% on the back of a completed capital raising.
Wide Open Agriculture is in the business of regenerative food and farming. Through its farmland portfolio and Dirty Clean Food brand, the company grows, markets and distributes food products.
More specifically, Dirty Clean Food offers regeneratively grown animal and plant-based products, such as lamb, beef, milk, and bread, to consumers located primarily in Australia and South-East Asia.
Wide Open Agriculture is dual-listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange and has been publicly listed in Australia since July 2018.
Details of the capital raising
Wide Open Agriculture shares resumed trading on the ASX this morning after being placed in a trading halt at the beginning of the week.
The resumption of trading came as the company announced the successful completion of a $3 million institutional placement.
The placement will see Wide Open Agriculture issue around 11 million new ordinary shares to institutional and sophisticated investors at a price of 27 cents apiece. This represents an 18.2% discount to the company's last closing price of 33 cents.
Wide Open Agriculture stated that the placement was strongly supported by existing shareholders. It also introduced a number of new, high net-worth investors to its share register.
The company believes the strong demand for the placement provides validation of its growth strategy to increase revenue and launch additional products for its growing customer base.
Following this boost to its cash reserves, Wide Open Agriculture will now work towards expanding and diversifying its online product offering, launching oat milk and plant-based protein products for Australian and global markets, and accelerating sales of regenerative meat.
Commenting on the placement, managing director Ben Cole said:
"The overwhelming demand from institutional and sophisticated investors is a strong endorsement of WOA's execution to date, but also demonstrates the belief that the Company is positioned to grow alongside the rapidly expanding base of conscious food consumers and regenerative farmers."
"Our highly capable, experienced team is now ready to grow the Company and maximise shareholder return and scale our positive impact," he added.
At the time of writing, Wide Open Resources shares are changing hands at 40 cents apiece, taking the company's current market capitalisation to just $28 million.
