Opthea Successfully Completes Institutional Offer and Increases Capital Raising to A$90.0m (US$57.6 million¹)

• OPT has successfully completed the placement and institutional entitlement offer components of its previously announced capital raising
• As a result of strong demand from both existing and new domestic and offshore institutional investors Opthea has accepted an additional A$10.0 million in oversubscriptions, increasing the placement size to A$20.0 million and the total size of the capital raising to A$90.0 million
• The Placement and Institutional Entitlement Offer raised approximately A$73.7m
• The fully underwritten Retail Entitlement Offer to raise a further approximately A$16.3m will open on Thursday, 31 August 2023 and close at 5:00pm (Melbourne time) on Thursday, 14 September 2023

MELBOURNE, Australia, Aug. 28, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Opthea Limited (Opthea or the Company) (ASX:OPT; NASDAQ:OPT) is pleased to announce the successful completion of the institutional component of the capital raising announced on Thursday, 24 August 2023.

The non-underwritten institutional placement (Placement) and the institutional component (Institutional Entitlement Offer) of the fully underwritten 1 for 3.07 pro-rata accelerated non-renounceable entitlement offer (Entitlement Offer) together raised approximately A$73.7m. Approximately 160.2m shares will be issued under the Placement and the Institutional Entitlement Offer (New Shares) at an offer price of A$0.46 per New Share.

As a result of strong demand from both domestic and overseas institutional investors Opthea accepted A$10.0 million of oversubscriptions in the Placement, which raised approximately A$20.0 million, increasing the capital raising to A$90m (US$57.6 million).  The Institutional Entitlement Offer raised approximately A$53.7m. Eligible institutional shareholders took up approximately 47.0% of their entitlements with the shortfall placed to both new and existing institutional shareholders. New Shares to be issued under the Placement and the Institutional Entitlement Offer will rank equally with existing OPT shares in all respects from the date of issue.

Commenting on the outcome of the Placement and Institutional Entitlement Offer, Opthea’s CEO & Managing Director, Dr Megan Baldwin, said, “We appreciate the strong support from our current shareholders who have participated in this financing.  We are also very pleased to welcome several new investors onto the OPT share register, including U.S. and international healthcare specialist institutional funds.  This financing enables the Company to continue advancing the Phase 3 clinical trials ShORe and COAST for our VEGF-C/D ‘trap’ sozinibercept (OPT-302) for the treatment of wet AMD.  With topline data expected when patients complete the 52-week dosing period, we look forward to progressing these studies and bringing OPT-302 closer to realizing its potential to improve vision outcomes for patients with wet AMD for which there remains a significant unmet need despite the availability of standard of care anti-VEGF-A treatments.”