Online Stockmarket Trading Update

Another day, another dollar as Lend Lease becomes the latest company to announce a capital raising from institutional investors.   LLC will issue 50 million new shares to raise approximately A$302.5 million via an institutional placement. Proceeds from the raising will be used to strengthen the Lend Lease balance sheet following the recent A$240 million investment in Lend Lease Primelife (“LLP”) and to fund cost saving initiatives announced on 13 November 2008.

New shares will be issued at $6.05 per share, which represents a discount of:

• 10.5% discount to last traded price of $6.76

• 12.3% discount to yesterday’s close of $6.90

Lend Lease also plans to offer investors in Australia and New Zealand the opportunity to acquire shares under a proposed Share Purchase Plan (SPP) up to the value of A$10,000 each (subject to final confirmation from ASIC and ASX on the subscription amount). The SPP will be offered free of brokerage and transaction costs. Details of the SPP, including the Record Date for participation, are currently being finalised and will be announced shortly.

Lend Lease also confirmed that it is in line to achieve net operating profit after tax for FY09 between A$380 – $400 million, representing a 10-15% reduction to FY08 net operating profit after tax of A$447.1 million.  

There will be some adjustments to asset values for the FY09 following Lend Lease’s review of these assets.  The total additional impairment to be included in its financial accounts for the half year ended 31 December 2008 is A$297 million after tax. This amount will reduce the group’s statutory profit after tax, but will be a non operating charge and therefore will be excluded from the Group’s net operating profit after tax.

http://www.lendlease.com/llweb/llc/main.nsf/all/fi_shareprice