BL Premium reports that SA’s largest horse racing group, Phumelela Gaming & Leisure, is to receive a cash injection from the Oppenheimer family.  

This is to avert what might have been the demise of the sport in SA after the company filed for business rescue on Friday.  The group, which among others operates the Vaal racecourse, is believed to have a fighting chance to survive the business rescue process after a post-commencement loan agreement was offered by family office Mary Oppenheimer Daughters (MOD).  Wehann Smith, board member of MOD and director of the Racing Association, advised that the total amount of the deal was R100m, based on projections of what was needed by the financial team at Phumelela.  The company hopes to turn the corner within the next six months.  Smith commented:  “From the Oppenheimer family perspective this is not an attempt to save the company as such, it really is an attempt to save an industry as a whole.  The failure of Phumelela would have had an absolutely devastating effect on the industry; it could end the industry.”  Phumelela’s business rescue application follows those of a string of other financially distressed companies, including Edcon and Comair.  In common with many such companies, the effect of the coronavirus lockdown sent Phumelela to the brink of collapse as the horse racing industry froze race meetings and closed retail betting outlets.

• Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Ntando Thukwana at BusinessLive (paywall access only)

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