Friday, March 11, 2011

Vincent Tan to take Berjaya Retail private at 65 sen per share

KUALA LUMPUR: Premier Merchandise Sdn Bhd (PMSB), which controls 58.71% of Berjaya Retail Bhd has issued notice to take it private at 65 sen per share following the dismal performance of the shares since it was listed on Aug 16 last year.

B-Retail said on Friday, March 11 that PMSB had served a notice of unconditional takeover offer to take it private by buying the shares and irredeemable convertible preference shares (ICPS) which it does not own at 65 sen each.

Tan Sri Vincent Tan Chee Yioun Tan has a direct stake of 7.67% and indirect stake of 77.49% in B-Retail.

Tan is also the ultimate controlling shareholder of PMSB and owns 100% of PMSB via HQZ Credit Sdn Bhd. As at March 11, PMSB held 878.269 million B-Retail shares directly, which represented about 58.71% of the paid-up.

B-Retail said the shares and ICPS had not traded at or above the offer price of 65 sen since the listing of B-Retail on Bursa Malaysia Securities Bhd on Aug 16.

The five-day volume weighted average market price of B-Retail shares up to March 4, being the last trading day prior to the serving of the notice was 41.2 sen while for the ICPS, it was 33.5 sen.

At 41.2 sen, the offer for the shares at 65 sen each was a premium of 23.8 sen or 57.7%. The highest traded price since listing was 56.5 sen.

As for the ICPS, the offer was a premium of 31.5 sen or 94%. Its highest traded price since listing was 51 sen.

'The board has deliberated on the notice and does not intend to seek an alternative person to make a take-over offer for the offer shares and/or offer ICPS,' it said.

B-Retail said the board would appoint an independent adviser to advise the independent directors and minority shareholders on the reasonableness of the offer.

PMSB said in a separate statement issued via Maybank Investment Bank, said Tan, who was acting in concert with it, had direct and indirect stake of 73.62% prior to the conversion of the B-Retail ICPS by PMSB.

At the date of the notice, Tan's combined direct and indirect interest in B-Retail was 85.16%.

Since PMSB already owns more than 50% of the total voting shares of B-Retail at the date of the notice, the offer is not conditional upon any minimum number of valid acceptances of the offer shares or offer ICPS received.

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