The majority of the shares were placed with seven institutional investors, three of which are new entrants onto the AWE share register. AWE's register will now hold around 68% institutional shareholders and 32% retail investors. The top 20 shareholders will hold approximately 75% of the total shares on issue.
It is the first time since AWE floated six years ago that it does not have a major corporate shareholder, and without one the company may not be able to fight off any potential takeover bids.
The company will now have a 100% "free float" of its shares, which will make it easier to be included in the ASX 200 index at some time in the future.
Premier sold 40.83 million shares, with 10 million bought up by an unnamed overseas institutional investor.
Premier said the sale did not reflect on AWE's status but was a means to fund its recent West African exploration agreement with multi-national Fusion Oil and Gas.
AWE and Origin Energy Ltd are leaders in the $450 million BassGas project in Victoria's southeast, which aims to produce 20 petajoules (PJ) of gas per year from late 2004.
