Treasury To Sell Its Hartford Warrants

NU Online News Service, Sept. 20, 1:54 p.m. EDT

The Treasury Department said it will sell more than 52 million shares of The Hartford Financial Services Group Inc. warrants it holds that could garner the U.S. government about $547 million.

Tomorrow, the Treasury Department said it will commence a secondary public offering of more than 52 million warrants to purchase the common stock in a modified Dutch auction.

The sale will begin at 8 a.m. EDT and close at 6:30 p.m. EDT. Potential bidders for the warrants can place bids at any price, in increments of 10 cents a share, at or above the minimum bid price of $10.50 per warrant.

Proceeds of the sale will provide a return to taxpayers for Treasury's investment in the company in addition to dividend payments it received, the Treasury Department said.

Deutsche Bank Securities Inc. will manage the sale. Aladdin Capital LLC, Cabrera Capital Markets LLC, Lebentahl & Co. LLC, Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. LLC and SL Hare Capital Inc. are the co-managers.

The Hartford borrowed $3.4 billion from the Treasury last year under the Troubled Asset Relief Program.

In March, the company said it would raise the money with an offering of $1.45 billion of common stock, $500 of mandatory convertible preferred stock and $425 million in cash, for a total of $2.4 billion.

The 52 million warrants were given to Treasury to secure the TARP money. The Hartford stated in March that it had no intention of buying back the warrants from the Treasury.