Australian mining magnate Gina Rinehart has reduced her stake in Fairfax Media, publisher of the Sydney Morning Herald and the Age newspapers, less than three weeks after she increased her investment in the group.
Minutes after the close of trade on the Australian stock market on Thursday, Rinehart sold 3.7% of the business to a major Australian fund manager, reducing her ownership in Fairfax Media to 15%.
The 86.5m shares sold were worth A$50.1m (£33.0m). Rinehart remains the largest shareholder.
A statement by Rinehart's company, Hancock Prospecting, said that the sale was completed to "esolve an issue that arose concerning the directors and officers insurance policy, in the situation of a director having a greater than 15% shareholding in Fairfax.
"This was one of the key issues recently raised by the chairman of Fairfax and needed to be resolved by either the chairman authorising endeavours to raise the 15% limit, which has been able to be reasonably achieved by other companies, or, as also discussed with the chairman, by sale of shares so that the largest shareholder had less than 15%," said the statement by chief development officer, John Klepec. » | Alison Rourke in Sydney | Thursday, July 05, 2012
THE GUARDIAN: Gina Rinehart issues ultimatum to Fairfax chairman: Largest shareholder tells Roger Corbett to improve share price or resign, but media group dismisses her 'bid for editorial control' » | Alison Rourke in Sydney | Friday, June 29, 2012
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