Holding(s) in Company

RNS Number : 9092U

British Airways PLC

22 October 2010

 



TR-1: NOTIFICATION OF MAJOR INTEREST IN SHARES

1. Identity of the issuer or the underlying issuer of existing shares to which voting rights are attached:

British Airways Plc

2 Reason for the notification (please tick the appropriate box or boxes):
An acquisition or disposal of voting rights		X
An acquisition or disposal of qualifying financial instruments which may result in the acquisition of shares already issued to which voting rights are attached
An acquisition or disposal of instruments with similar economic effect to qualifying financial instruments
An event changing the breakdown of voting rights
Other (please specify):

3. Full name of person(s) subject to the notification obligation:	TIAA-CREF Investment Management, LLC Teachers Advisors, Inc
4. Full name of shareholder(s) (if different from 3.):	See number 9
5. Date of the transaction and date on which the threshold is crossed or reached:	10/20/2010
6. Date on which issuer notified:	10/21/2010
7. Threshold(s) that is/are crossed or reached:	3%

8. Notified details:
A: Voting rights attached to shares
Class/type of shares if possible using the ISIN CODE	Situation previous to the triggering transaction		Resulting situation after the triggering transaction
	Number of Shares	Number of Voting Rights	Number of shares	Number of voting rights		% of  voting rights
			Direct	Direct	Indirect	Direct	Indirect
GB0001290575	35,288,694	35,288,694	30,912,381	30,912,381		2.679%

B: Qualifying Financial Instruments
Resulting situation after the triggering transaction
Type of financial instrument	Expiration date	Exercise/ Conversion Period	Number of voting rights that may be acquired if the instrument is exercised/ converted.	% of voting rights
N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A

C: Financial Instruments with similar economic effect to Qualifying Financial Instruments
Resulting situation after the triggering transaction
Type of financial instrument	Exercise price	Expiration date	Exercise/ Conversion period	Number of voting rights instrument refers to	% of voting rights
					Nominal	Delta

Total (A+B+C)
Number of voting rights	Percentage of voting rights
30,912,381	2.679%

9. Chain of controlled undertakings through which the voting rights and/or the financial instruments are effectively held, if applicable:

The College Retirement Equities Fund ("CREF") hereby informs you that on October 20, 2010, CREF sold 4,376,313 shares of British Airways Plc, bringing its total holdings in your company to 30,809,351 shares.  CREF owns these shares through two of its investment accounts, the Global Equities Account, the Stock Account, and Social Choice.  It is our understanding the total voting shares outstanding of British Airways Plc is 1,153,689,440 shares bringing CREF's ownership in your company to a 2.670 level.

For your information, CREF, is a U.S. based investment company, which is registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC").  CREF has multiple investment accounts, each with separate investment objectives and policies.  All assets in the accounts are beneficially owned by CREF, and all the accounts are managed by TIAA-CREF Investment Management, LLC, and an SEC registered investment adviser. Additionally, affiliates of CREF own 103,030 shares in your company.  These holdings are owned by TIAA-CREF Funds ("Funds"), The affiliated funds, aggregated with those of CREF; own a total of 30,912,381 or 2.679% of the outstanding voting shares of your company.  Because Teachers Advisors, Inc. and TIAA-CREF Investment Management, LLC follow the same policies when voting these funds, we are aggregating the holdings for the purpose of this letter.

Proxy Voting:
10. Name of the proxy holder:	Equitable Nominees Limited
11. Number of voting rights proxy holder will cease to hold:	N/A
12. Date on which proxy holder will cease to hold voting rights:	N/A

13. Additional information:	None
14. Contact name:	William J Wilkinson
15. Contact telephone number:	212-490-9000

Alan Buchanan

Company Secretary

British Airways Plc

 

END

 

 

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