Atos said on Friday it is launching a reverse stock split as the French IT group aims to restore investor confidence after completing a financial restructuring plan last year to overcome a crushing debt crisis.
The stock split will start on March 25 and will end on April 23, Atos said in a statement.
The company is consolidating its shares such that every 10,000 old shares, each with a par value of 0.0001 euros, will now become a new share with a par value of 1 euro.
The new shares, priced at an indicative value of 49 euros ($53.02), will begin trading on April 24.
Atos’ shares are trading at all-time lows, to about half of a cent, after the company completed a 233-million-euro capital increase last year, causing massive dilution for shareholders.
The reverse stock split aims to reduce share price volatility and “support a new stock market dynamic,” the firm added.
Atos, which owns the supercomputers essential to France’s nuclear deterrent, will hold a capital markets day event in May to announce its new strategy.
($1 = 0.9242 euros)
(Reporting by Gianluca Lo Nostro in Gdansk; Editing by Christian Schmollinger and Janane Venkatraman)
