Director/PDMR Shareholding

RNS Number : 7712O

Character Group PLC

22 September 2011

 



22 September 2011

The Character Group plc

("the Company")

Transaction in Own Shares

Directors' Shareholdings

As part of the Company's stated objective to enhance shareholder value, the Company advises that yesterday it bought back 505,000 ordinary shares of 5p each in the capital of the Company ("Ordinary Shares") for cancellation in the market at a price of 175 pence per share. This represents approximately 2.14 per cent of the current issued share capital of the Company (excluding shares held in treasury).

A total of 713,500 Ordinary Shares have now been bought back in the current financial year which commenced on 1 September 2011. This represents 3.09 per cent of the current issued share capital of the Company (excluding shares held in treasury).

For the purposes of the Financial Services Authority's Disclosure and Transparency Rules, the total number of Ordinary Shares in issue as at the date of this notice (taking into account the Ordinary Shares purchased for cancellation by the Company announced above and excluding Ordinary Shares held in treasury) is 23,107,081  ("Revised Issued Voting Share Capital").

The Company announces that 400,000 of the Ordinary Shares bought back for cancellation yesterday by the Company were acquired from certain of the executive directors of the Company or their related parties, as detailed below.

The participation by any Director or his related parties in the buy-back programme is deemed to be a related party transaction for the purposes of Rule 13 of the AIM Rules for Companies (the "AIM Rules").  The Non-Executive Directors of the Company, Lord Birdwood and David Harris, who are independent of this deemed related party transaction for the purposes of the AIM Rules, having consulted with Charles Stanley Securities (the Company's Nominated Adviser), consider the participation of the above by certain of the executive directors  in the buy-back programme to be fair and reasonable insofar as the Company's shareholders are concerned.

The Company has further been notified that, in separate transactions conducted through the market yesterday, Kiran Shah acquired 435,000 Ordinary Shares into his SIPP at a price of 175 pence per share and  Sarissa Holdings Limited, a company in which Kiran Shah is deemed to be interested, sold a total of 600,000 Ordinary Shares at a price of 175 pence per share. The interests of all of the Directors following these transactions are set out below:

Director	Number of Ordinary Shares sold	Number of Ordinary Shares following sale	% of Revised Issued Voting Share Capital
R. King1	165,000	3,831,209	16.58%
K.P. Shah2	165,000	5,573,250	24.12%
J.J. Diver3	50,000	1,046,003	4.53%
J.J.P. Kissane	20,000	600,000	2.60%
M .S. Hyde	-	100,000	0.43%
Orbis Pension Trustees Limited4	-	285,000	1.23%
D. Harris	-	44,097	0.19%
Lord Birdwood	-	8,750	0.04%

Notes:

1.         included in the interests of R. King are his interests in 1,635,428 Ordinary Shares held by Cedarberg Investments Limited,  and 871,750 Ordinary Shares held by the TOPS Pension Scheme;

2.         included in the interests of K.P. Shah are the interests of Sarissa Holdings Limited in 5,030,000 Ordinary Shares and 518,250 Ordinary Shares of Mr Shah's personal pension scheme;

3.         included in the interests of J.J. Diver are 401,867 Ordinary Shares held by Mr Diver's personal pension scheme;

4.         Orbis Pension Trustees Limited is the trustee of the Company's Employee Share Ownership Trust. Each of R. King, K.P. Shah, J.J.P. Kissane, J.J. Diver and M.S.Hyde is deemed to be interested in such Ordinary Shares by virtue of being within the class of beneficiaries defined by such trust.

The Company has a total unutilised capacity to buy back up to a further 4,749,000 Ordinary Shares under the authority granted at the Annual General Meeting in January 2011.

The Company holds 4,019,456 Ordinary Shares in treasury, representing approximately 17.39 per cent of the Revised Issued Voting Share Capital, which do not carry voting rights.

The figure of 23,107,081may be used by shareholders as the denominator for the calculations by which they will determine if they are required to notify their interest, or change to their interest, in the Company under the Disclosure and Transparency Rules.

Enquiries:
Richard King, Chairman		Russell Cook
Kiran Shah, Group Finance Director & Joint MD	Fiona Tooley	Carl Holmes
The Character Group plc	Citigate Dewe Rogerson	Charles Stanley Securities
Tel: [phone]	Tel: [phone]	(Nominated Adviser)
		Tel: [phone]
Ticker: AIM: CCT

 

END

 

 

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