AirAsia to swap stock for full ownership of loyalty programme

Malaysia’s AirAsia Group and Aimia Holdings have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) for a $25m stock swap deal, for the latter’s 20% equity interest in the airline group’s loyalty programme. The parties inked a share sale and purchase agreement for Aimia to sell 1.67m ordinary shares in BigLife to AirAsia Group for a $25m consideration. This will be satisfied by 85.9m new ordinary shares in AirAsia Group, issued at MYR1.20 ($0.29) each, the company said in a 22 March Bursa Malaysia disclosure. If it materialises, the deal will increase Aimia’s stake in AirAsia Group to approximately 3.1%, the investment holding company said. AirAsia Group recently raised over MYR330b for short-term cash needs, from a private placement of 470m new shares. These were issued across two tranches in February and March, at MYR0.675 and MYR0.865 per share, respectively. A stock exchange filing shows the company had over 3.8b issued shares as at 17 March, upon the conclusion of the private placement, with MYR8.36b in issued share capital.<br/>