TAP now 100% public
Portuguese airline TAP is now 100% state owned after the State injected €1.736Bn into the company.
The Government made a fresh capital increase in TAP, with an injection of €536 million and a loan of €1.200Bn of State money converted into capital. The holding now no longer has a share in the airline.
The capital increase will effectively cover a €1.548Bn black hole in the airline’s finances, while the remainder will be used to shore up the company’s own capital.
The capital increase for TAP was approved at an extraordinary general assembly meeting on Thursday and includes a partial cover of around €1.5Bn in losses.
The airline informed the market (CMVM) in a communiqué on Thursday afternoon which revealed the details of the operations approved at the extraordinary general assembly meeting. The capital increase included the conversion of €154.4 million in supplementary instalments which total €503.5 million.
This capital was later reduced to zero in order to partially cover the losses which were blamed on the Covid-19 pandemic.
The operation included a second capital increase of €1.794Bn, subscribed entirely by the State, of which €1.258Bn resulted from an injection of a credit conversion loan from the Portuguese Republic into TAP, and €536 million in fresh capital.
This was followed by a new capital reduction to cover losses, with the capital being reduced by €890.2 million to a final sum of €904.33 million.
Out of the two capital reduction operations, TAP cleared losses of €1.548Bn from accrued past losses.
The company’s latest financial results for the second half of 2021 show that the company had €1.331Bn in negative results carried forward, including €493 million in losses to June and €134.5 million in the third quarter.