This rule requires that when a company makes an offer of shares to the public and if that offer is oversubscribed, the allocation of shares be done equitably, in that every applicant who applies for a like number of shares, at or above the clearing price, should be allocated a like number of shares.
Juxtapose this situation with the overall decline in retail investor participation in the market, the decline of personal stockbroking and the general “institutionalisation” of our public market, with the resulting year-on-year steady reduction in the number of listed companies. Deliberately excluding the public from the public market has broad consequences.
In the distant past a company would publish an abridged prospectus and application form in the financial press, which applicants could fill out, append a cheque to, and post to the transfer secretary. Thousands of cheques had to be cleared, share certificates issued, and refunds made. That was administratively intensive. Today we have online trading platforms, banking apps, payment gateways,, and e-Fica services: a truly sophisticated electronic financial infrastructure.