The shares of Great Eastern Holdings Ltd. will probably resume trading in Singapore after the insurer had not won enough shareholder support for his delisting plan, which was made by the overseas chinese banking corp. was supported.
About 63.5% of the insurer’s minority shareholders voted for a delisted delistin, who, however, broke back, which was necessary for the introduction of Great Eastern Private on Tuesday after an extraordinary general assembly. As a result, the offer of $ 900 million ($ 704 million) from OCBC, said the country’s second largest lender in a separate registration.
The failure of the deal is a setback for OCBC, which has had the majority of Great Eastern since 2004 and has tried several times to take the 117-year-old insurer Private. Helen Wong, Chief Executive Officer from OCBC said that it wanted to fully integrate its banking transactions, asset management and insurance and that the possession of the entire Great Eastern would help improve its shareholders.
In order to support Great Eastern’s Delisting proposal, the OCBC offered the 6.28% of the insurer, which it does not have, offered $ 30.15 per share. The offer improved by 17.8%last month compared to the previous offer.
Great Eastern, one of the largest insurers in Singapore and Malaysia, has total assets of more than $ 100 billion with over 16 million policyholders. OCBC’s shares closed 0.8% on Tuesday compared to a profit of 0.4% in the broader index of the Straits Times.
“Whether OCBC has 94% or 100%, only minimally affects the result or strategy, since they already have control,” said Jayden Vantarakis, head of equity research for Southeast Asia at Macquarie Capital and added that the market’s view will not change with the latest result.
The trade in Great Eastern has been suspended since July 2024 after OCBC had not received a sufficient level for a delistative or mandatory acquisition with its previous offer. The latest offer this year was still lower than the embedded value of the insurer in 2024 of $ 38.08 per share, a metric that was used to evaluate insurers elsewhere and cited by resistant Minority shareholders Request a higher offer.
Great Eastern will issue new shares to meet the listing rules of the Exchange. According to the stock problems, the participation of OCBC in the Great Eastern will be around 88% compared to the current level of around 94%, the insurer said in an earlier statement. There was no date for the resumption of trade.
In the past 10 years, the insurer has contributed an average of around $ 700 million per year in the net profit for OCBC, which corresponds to an average of around 15% of the annual profit from OCBC during this period, according to the bank.
