Sina Corp (新浪) has agreed to go private after an entity led by its chairman, Charles Chao (趙廣民), boosted its offer for the Chinese social media company to US$43.30 a share in cash.
The Beijing-based company said that the offer implied an equity value for the company of US$2.59 billion and represented a 7.7 percent premium to its closing price on Friday last week.
It is also an increase from a buyout proposal that Singapore-based New Wave Holdings Ltd made in July at US$41 a share.
Chinese companies that once pursued the recognition and liquidity of listing their shares in the US have shown an increasing appetite to turn instead to their home markets.
Qihoo 360 Technology Co (奇虎三六零) delisted from the New York Stock Exchange in July 2016 and then sold shares in Shanghai in 2018 as 360 Security Technology Inc (三六零安全科技).
A number of Chinese tech firms have since delisted from US exchanges or turned to other markets amid growing scrutiny by regulators.
Tencent Holdings Ltd (騰訊) in July offered to buy out and take private search engine Sogou Inc (搜狗) in a US$2.1 billion deal, while 58.com Inc (五八同城) agreed to be bought out by a private equity consortium for US$8.7 billion.
Sina went public in 2000 on the NASDAQ during the dotcom boom, alongside other pioneers from China’s technology sector. It operates Sina Weibo (微博).
New Wave in July submitted a preliminary non-binding proposal letter to take the company private.
It said the current offer is an 18 percent premium to the closing price on July 2, the last trading day before the earlier offer.
SETBACK: Apple’s India iPhone push has been disrupted after Foxconn recalled hundreds of Chinese engineers, amid Beijing’s attempts to curb tech transfers Apple Inc assembly partner Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), also known internationally as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), has recalled about 300 Chinese engineers from a factory in India, the latest setback for the iPhone maker’s push to rapidly expand in the country. The extraction of Chinese workers from the factory of Yuzhan Technology (India) Private Ltd, a Hon Hai component unit, in southern Tamil Nadu state, is the second such move in a few months. The company has started flying in Taiwanese engineers to replace staff leaving, people familiar with the matter said, asking not to be named, as the
The prices of gasoline and diesel at domestic fuel stations are to rise NT$0.1 and NT$0.4 per liter this week respectively, after international crude oil prices rose last week, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) and Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) announced yesterday. Effective today, gasoline prices at CPC and Formosa stations are to rise to NT$27.3, NT$28.8 and NT$30.8 per liter for 92, 95 and 98-octane unleaded gasoline respectively, the companies said in separate statements. The price of premium diesel is to rise to NT$26.2 per liter at CPC stations and NT$26 at Formosa pumps, they said. The announcements came after international crude oil prices
DOLLAR SIGNS: The central bank rejected claims that the NT dollar had appreciated 10 percentage points more than the yen or the won against the greenback The New Taiwan dollar yesterday fell for a sixth day to its weakest level in three months, driven by equity-related outflows and reactions to an economics official’s exchange rate remarks. The NT dollar slid NT$0.197, or 0.65 percent, to close at NT$30.505 per US dollar, central bank data showed. The local currency has depreciated 1.97 percent so far this month, ranking as the weakest performer among Asian currencies. Dealers attributed the retreat to foreign investors wiring capital gains and dividends abroad after taking profit in local shares. They also pointed to reports that Washington might consider taking equity stakes in chipmakers, including Taiwan Semiconductor
A German company is putting used electric vehicle batteries to new use by stacking them into fridge-size units that homes and businesses can use to store their excess solar and wind energy. This week, the company Voltfang — which means “catching volts” — opened its first industrial site in Aachen, Germany, near the Belgian and Dutch borders. With about 100 staff, Voltfang says it is the biggest facility of its kind in Europe in the budding sector of refurbishing lithium-ion batteries. Its CEO David Oudsandji hopes it would help Europe’s biggest economy ween itself off fossil fuels and increasingly rely on climate-friendly renewables. While
RSS