RWE AG (RWE.XE) Tuesday said the greenshoe option the German utility has granted the bookrunners of last week's placement of shares in American Water Works Co. (AWK) has been fully exercised, reducing its stake in the U.S. water utility to around 47%.

A spokesman for RWE said all 3.9 million shares on offer will be placed with the bookrunners - Merrill Lynch & Co., Citi and Goldman, Sachs & Co. - at $17.25 a share, the same price buyers paid in the secondary offer last Friday.

The proceeds of the greenshoe transaction amount to around $67 million, the spokesman said.

Last Friday, RWE sold 11.5 million shares in American Water in a secondary offer that supplemented a rights issue by American Water. The transaction resulted in proceeds of around $200 million for RWE, with the firm lowering its stake to below 50% from around 60%.

RWE had previously announced its intention to reduce the stake in American Water to below 50% to fully deconsolidate the U.S. water utility from its balance sheet. The company last week said the deconsolidation of American Water will result in a reduction of net debt by around EUR4.5 billion.

RWE said the company still wants to sell all of its shares in American Water, but has said the exact timeframe depends on the wider market environment.

Around a year ago, RWE sold around 36% of American Water's shares at $21.50 a share in an initial public offering. The IPO price was lower than had been expected and resulted in a EUR600 million impairment charge that considerably dented RWE's 2008 earnings.

Company Web site: www.rwe.com

-By Jan Hromadko, Dow Jones Newswires; +49 69 29 725 503; jan.hromadko@dowjones.com