It'll be pure, dispassionate arithmetic. Simplified example:...

It'll be pure, dispassionate arithmetic.

Simplified example:
Suppose a shortfall of $1.0m and three shareholders oversubscribed, Shareholders A, B and C. A holds 2 shares, B holds 3 shares and C 5 shares. A oversubscribed by $1.0m, B by $0.6m and C by $0.2m.

The outcome of this is that C gets their full oversubscription ($0.2m) as it's less than their maximum allocation proportionate to existing holdings. A and B take the remaining $0.8m in proportion to existing holdings - $0.32m for A and $0.48m for B.

A and B would be returned cash of $0.68m and $0.12m respectively.

Hope that makes sense.

In reality the 24% of oversubscriptions will be dominated by the big existing holders, so any mortals will only have a trifling amount of shortfall shares. The shortfall itself was only 5% of the new shares to be created from the 1 in 9 rights issue, in other words 0.5% of the company's total number of shares on completion, so there aren't many to go around.