Methanex Completes Secondary Offering and Share Repurchase

Vancouver-based Methanex Corporation completed, on June 5, 2003, its secondary offering of 37,946,876 common shares beneficially owned by Calgary-based NOVA Chemicals Corporation. The common shares were sold to a syndicate of underwriters led by RBC Dominion Securities Inc., and including CIBC World Markets Inc., Scotia Capital Inc., TD Securities Inc., Citigroup Global Markets Canada Inc. and UBS Securities Canada Inc., for $13.30 per share and aggregate proceeds of $504.7 million. The offering was made on both sides of the border pursuant to the multijurisdictional disclosure system.

On June 30, Methanex completed its indirect repurchase of the remaining nine million common shares owned by NOVA. The share repurchase, which was announced concurrently with the secondary offering, was conditional upon Methanex obtaining the approval of its disinterested shareholders. Methanex repurchased the shares for $13.30 per share for aggregate proceeds to NOVA of $119.7 million.

Methanex was represented in-house by Randy Milner, senior vice-president, general counsel and corporate secretary; assisted in Canada, by McCarthy Tétrault LLP with a team that included Richard Balfour, Michael Urbani, Brian Vick, Linda Brown, Darren Watt and Salman Manki (corporate and securities) and Ed Kroft and Douglas Cannon (tax); and in the U.S., by Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson with a team that included Ken Blackman, Ipek Candan and Cyrus Richardson, III (corporate and securities) and Robert Cassanos and Joseph Calto (tax).

NOVA was represented in-house by Jack Mustoe, senior vice-president, legal, and general counsel; assisted in Canada, by Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt LLP with a team that included Stan Magidson, Robert Lando, Pierre Magnan, Dana Easthope and Martin Mix (corporate and securities) and Andrew Kingissepp, Firoz Ahmed and Julie Colden (tax); and in the U.S., by Alan Talkington and Scott Porter of Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP in San Francisco.

The underwriting syndicate was represented in Canada, by Stikeman Elliott LLP with a team that included Jonathan Drance, John Anderson, Simon Romano and Donald Belovich (corporate and securities) and Lianne Miller (tax); and in the U.S., by Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP with a team that included Christopher Morgan, Jason Saltzman, Raziel Zisman and Eric Spindel (corporate and securities) in Toronto, and Eric Sensenbrenner (tax) and Jerry Jackson (environmental) in Washington, D.C.