Choppies Enterprises: Botswana retailer to seek JSE listing

Standard Chartered, which owns 12.8 percent of Choppies Enterprises, is working with the Botswana supermarket chain on a secondary Johannesburg listing as the retailer expands in the region. “Choppies is considering a secondary listing on the JSE early in 2015 to access a new group of South African institutional investors,” Peter Baird, the head of Africa private equity for the London-based bank, said this week. Choppies has a market value of 4.7 billion pula (R5.7bn) on the Botswana exchange. The retailer has operations in its home market, Zimbabwe and South Africa. Baird said it planned to grow in Zimbabwe and Zambia and potentially in Tanzania. Standard Chartered said last month that Baird was working as a director of Choppies after the bank bought the stake for an undisclosed sum. – Bloomberg