China Resources climbs after business disposal
Updated: 2015-04-22 07:07
By Bloomberg(HK Edition)
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China Resources Enterprise Ltd's (CRE) share price rose the most in more than two decades on Tuesday after saying it will sell off businesses, including its main money-losing retail venture with Tesco Plc, and focus on the world's best-selling beer.
The stock ended 56 percent higher at HK$23.7 at the close of trading in Hong Kong after resuming trading from a suspension on April 8.
The company will sell its non-beer assets for HK$28 billion and as much as a 10-percent stake to its State-owned parent, CRE said. The parent will offer HK$12.7 a share for the stake after the disposal.
CRE's multi-business structure "can't reflect full value", Yan Biao, a representative of the parent China Resources Holdings (CRH) said on Tuesday.
The disposal sets a clear direction for the listed company as "mainland retail growth will continue to face challenges", Yan said.
The deal leaves CRE with the brewery business, producer of the world's best-selling Snow Beer and which contributed a fifth of 2014 sales and most of the profit. The company has struggled to turn around the retail unit, which caused a full-year loss as the mainland's economy slowed and the government's anti-graft measures hurt retail sales.
Snow Beer had a 23-percent market share on the mainland in 2013, compared with Tsingtao Brewery Co's 17 percent in second place, CRE said.
The disposal "turns the company from loss-making into profit-making immediately", UOB-Kay Hian Holdings Ltd analyst Renee Tai said, adding that beer is CRE's crown jewel due to its "solid market share".
The retail arm, which includes hypermarkets, supermarkets and convenience stores, reported an underlying loss of HK$1.4 billion last year, compared with the beer unit's HK$761 million in profit.
The sale turns CRE "into a beer-focused business that owns the best-selling beer brand in the world since 2008 by sales volume, unburdened from the previous conglomerate structure", the company said.
CRE partnered with SABMiller Plc to brew Snow Beer in 1994, and that brand became the world's biggest by volume when it overtook Bud Light in 2008, according to London-based SABMiller's website.
CRE operates 98 beer-making factories, able to produce 200 million hectoliters (5.3 billion gallons) a year, Chief Financial Officer Frank Lai Ni-hium said.
The beer unit is set to penetrate further into the mainland's third and fourth-tier cities, according to the company.
The disposal price is 5.6 percent higher than the HK$26 billion value of the non-beer businesses, while the share offer gives a 33-percent premium to the estimated HK$9.5 per share value for the remaining beer business, said Jessie Guo, an analyst at Jefferies Hong Kong Ltd.
CRH will boost its stake in the listed company to 62 percent, from 52 percent, following the deal.
(HK Edition 04/22/2015 page8)