HARARE (Reuters) – Global mining giant Anglo American Plc on Friday announced the sale of its remaining shareholding in Thungela Resources, completing its exit from the South African coal business.
Under pressure from investors to exit coal businesses worldwide, the owner of gold, platinum and diamond mining companies, Anglo American hived off its entire stake in its South African coal mines into Thungela and distributed most of the shares to its shareholders through an initial public offering in June, barring 8%.
At the time of listing, investors had written off the prospects of Thungela amid global pressure on companies and countries to wean industries off of coal.
But rising coal prices turned the tables for Thungela and its shares are up six-fold in the last nine months.
Anglo said it sold its residual Thungela shareholding for 154 rand per share, realising gross proceeds of 1.67 billion rand ($115 million).
Thungela’s shares were trading at 160.68 rand at 0741 GMT on Friday, down 8.85%. The company listed at 25 rand per share in June.
On March 22, Thungela reported its first full-year profit for the year ended December 2021 of 6.9 billion rand, driven by higher coal prices.
($1 = 14.5279 rand)
(Reporting by Nelson Banya; editing by Jason Neely; Editing by Promit Mukherjee)