South African billionaire Christo Wiese's Brait wants to take Virgin Active public and is raising $152 million to get there

Brait SE, the investment holding company controlled by South African billionaire Christo Wiese, is moving to position Virgin Active for a public listing or a sale, beginning with a R2.5 billion ($152.1 million) rights offer announced alongside its full-year results for the year through March 2026, released on Thursday.

Brait's stake in Virgin Active is currently valued at approximately R9.39 billion ($570.9 million), and the company said in its results statement that it wants to optimise the fitness chain's positioning for an eventual exit. The rights offer will price shares at R1.51 ($0.092) each, a 43 percent discount to Brait's net asset value per share once the offer is completed.

The Virgin Active push sits inside a broader debt reduction strategy Brait has pursued since 2020, when its net debt stood at R7 billion ($425.8 million). That figure has since fallen to R1.7 billion ($103.4 million), achieved through asset disposals and the 2023 listing of Premier, the food producer that was once part of Brait's core holdings. Wiese's company now wants to repeat that playbook with Virgin Active, though on a considerably larger scale.

Before any listing can happen, Brait said Virgin Active needs to repay a portion of its existing debt to reach a more suitable leverage ratio. To get there, Virgin Active will raise £175 million (R3.80 billion, $231.1 million) from its existing shareholders, with Brait contributing £108 million to cover its pro-rata share. The capital raise is designed to bring Virgin Active's net debt to EBITDA ratio down to 2.0 times and to fund the company's club refurbishment plan and new club rollout strategy.

Virgin Active is also refinancing its existing South African and international facilities. Brait said the refinancing, combined with the capital raise, will produce an annual interest saving of £14 million (R304.20 million, $18.5 million). Brait is separately looking to exit its stake in New Look, the UK apparel chain, which is currently valued at R723 million ($44 million) on Brait's books.

The numbers behind Thursday's announcement point to a business that has recovered fully from the disruption of the pandemic. Virgin Active posted EBITDA growth of 37 percent to £110 million (R2.39 billion, $145.4 million) for the year, driven by new gym openings and refurbishments of existing locations. Brait described a well-developed pipeline of further growth opportunities and said the business is now positioned for an exit within the next two years. "Growth forecast from new gyms and the refurbishment program will position the business well for an exit in the next two years," the company said.

At the group level, Brait reported a strong year. Investment value gains rose 51.05 percent to R1.8 billion ($109.5 million), while operating expenses held flat and finance costs dropped 9.17 percent to R436 million ($26.5 million). The combination pushed Brait's profit for the year to R1.32 billion ($80.3 million), almost double the R672 million ($40.9 million) it reported in the 2025 financial year. Basic earnings per share rose just under 48 percent to 34 cents.

Brait gave a specific timeline for the listing for the first time, tempering some of the more optimistic targets the company had floated in prior years. "Given current market conditions, the target date for a listing of Virgin Active is the second half of 2027 or the first half of 2028," the company said. That timeline pushes the listing back from earlier guidance, when Brait had pointed to the second half of 2026 before later signalling a more likely window of early 2027. Brait has previously told Bloomberg that a listing is most likely to happen in the UK, with a secondary offer in Johannesburg.

Wiese remains Brait's largest shareholder, with his investment vehicle Titan holding a stake of approximately 38 percent. He built his fortune primarily through Pepkor and his long tenure as chairman of Shoprite, before turning Brait into the investment vehicle through which he acquired Virgin Active from Richard Branson's Virgin Group in 2015. The fitness chain has since become Brait's single largest asset, and its recovery from pandemic-era closures now stands as the centrepiece of Wiese's plan to unlock value from a portfolio that has spent six years methodically paying down debt and preparing its remaining assets for the public markets.