JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – When South African listed companies raise money locally, they rarely include smaller shareholders.

Now, collaboration between Johannesburg- and Sydney-listed Orion Minerals, headed by CEO Errol Smart, and Utshalo, headed by Paul Miller, is aimed at bringing Australia Stock Exchange- (ASX-) style shareholder participation to smaller South African shareholders through the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE).

Orion, which is listed on the JSE and the ASX, has more than 22 000 South African shareholders. In undertaking a capital raising to progress its Prieska Copper Zinc Mine and Okiep Copper Project in South Africa’s Northern Cape, its eligible South African shareholders are being enabled to participate in its latest share purchase plan (SPP), in the same way as Australian shareholders participate.

The collaboration is necessary because there is no equivalent to an SPP in South Africa's public markets.

To regain vibrancy, South African public markets need to adopt more practices from markets such as the ASX, and Orion, as an ASX primary listed company, subject to ASX listing rules, is showing the way, Miller, who has experience as an approved JSE sponsor executive, stated in a release to Mining Weekly.

In addition to a placement of 513-million shares at A$0.015c a share to sophisticated and professional investors, eligible South African shareholders will also be allowed to subscribe to the SPP, undertaken to provide eligible existing shareholders at the equivalent of R0.18c a share, as Orion would like to ensure that all its eligible South African resident shareholders have the opportunity to participate in the SPP alongside their ASX peers.

Eligible shareholders will be able to participate on Utshalo’s online platform.

As a division of Ince, Utshalo is a juristic representative of InsuranceSupermarket Insurance Brokers, an authorised financial services provider.

Although headquartered in Australia, Orion’s primary focus is on advancing its portfolio in South Africa. Boksburg-born geologist Smart chairs the Junior Mining and Exploration Forum of Minerals Council South Africa.

South Africa has a pressing need to reawaken its public markets amid new mining capital raisings having become too few and far between.

Far more direct retail participation is needed than is currently the case and Utshalo has recognised the pressing need to recreate a direct relationship between non-institutional investors and companies seeking growth capital.