Realty Income (O +0.41%) is knocking on the door of the markets to shore up its capital foundation. The company announced that it is floating 6.5 million shares of its common stock in an underwritten public issue. In addition, the company intends to grant the offering's underwriters a 30-day purchase option for up to an additional 975,000 shares to cover oveallotments, if any.
Realty Income said it expects to use the proceeds of the issue to retire debt from its $1 billion acquisition facility. That credit line has been, and will be, used to fund real estate assets.
The joint book-running managers of the offering are Bank of America's Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, JPMorgan Chase's J.P. Morgan, Leucadia's Jefferies, Royal Bank of Canada arm RBC Capital Markets, UBS Investment Bank, and the Securities wing of Wells Fargo.
At the moment, Realty Income has just over 51 million shares outstanding, and its stock most recently closed at $41.25 per share.
