Huatai Motor wants high premium to control Saab's parent company

On May 3, the private car company Huatai Group announced in Beijing that it has signed a strategic partnership agreement with SAAB, a well-known brand under General Motors Corporation, and will initiate the launch of Spyker, the parent company of its wholly-owned subsidiary Saab. 30% of equity acquisitions. However, a number of industry insiders said that the acquisition by Huatai of the veteran automobile company's pioneering automobile engine turbocharged technology cannot obscure Saab’s previous risk of “indefinitely stopping production”.

Spyker CEO Viktor Müller said on the same day to the "Economic Information Daily" reporter that the Huatai Automobile spent 150 million euros, of which 120 million euros to acquire 29.9% stake in Dutch Spyker, and issued 30 million euros in 6 The monthly convertible loan, with an interest rate of 7% per annum, will be converted into a stake in Dutch Spyker at a price of 4.88 euro per share in the future. Among them, Huatai Motor's first phase investment of 30 million euros. Zhang Ruijun, vice president of Huatai Automobile Co., Ltd., said that after the completion of the acquisition, Huatai will become the largest shareholder of Spyker. In the future, the two parties will evaluate the production according to production and management, and “does not rule out further investment by Huatai”.

The audited Huatai Automobile 2010 annual financial data shows that as of the end of December 2010, Huatai Automobile's total assets were 12.52 billion yuan and shareholders' equity was 6.11 billion yuan. In 2010, the company's net profit was 350 million yuan, an increase of approximately 0.2 billion yuan year-on-year.

Saab’s previous situation is not optimistic. Saab sold only 28,000 in 2010, lower than the 50,000 expected value. Prior to this strategic cooperation, Muller also admitted that Saab could not make profits before 2012.

In the first quarter of this year, Spyker, the parent company of Saab Automotive, turned profitable in the same period last year, with a loss of 79 million euros, compared with 6.96 million euros in the same period last year. In early April, Saab’s suppliers stopped shipping due to default on bills and Saab was forced to suspend production indefinitely. However, Muller is very optimistic about Saab's prospects: “In contrast to the previous 67 years of knitting a global dealer network, Spyker Holland will instantly have Huatai Networks' network of more than 4,000 dealers in China.” He also predicted that Saab Motors is expected to Reproduction, and the Chinese government's approval of the agreement only takes 6-12 weeks.

The reporter roughly calculated and confirmed by industry insiders that this acquisition of Spyker is a high premium purchase. In September 3rd (local time 13:28:42), Spyker Cars had a share price of 4.94 Euros per share on the Euronext Amsterdam at the conclusion of the strategic cooperation agreement between Spyker and Huatai Motors. And on January 26, 2010, when Spyker reached an agreement with General Motors, the closing price per share was 3.91 euros. During the two agreements, Spyker gained about 26.34% per share.

According to a comprehensive purchase agreement reached between Spyker and GM at the beginning of last year, Spyker will pay 7.4 billion U.S. dollars in cash, and U.S. will also receive 326 million U.S. dollars worth of redeemable preferred shares worth a total of 400 million U.S. dollars. . According to rough calculations, if the conversion rate is close to 30%, the Spyker spent 120 million U.S. dollars, according to the then exchange rate of 1.4100 between the euro and the U.S. dollar, with a contract value of 855.1 million euros.

Although holding the Dutch Spyker, but Huatai Automobile parties admit that the details of the management of the Chinese side to the Chinese joint venture plant in China and even the world of Spyker headquarters, has not yet been finalized, and the strategic cooperation with Huatai Automobile is Saab, and No other subsidiary of Spyker Netherlands is involved. This means that when Saab announced the indefinite suspension of work, Huatai paid 150 million euros for the acquisition of Spyker, which represented a premium of 76.26% over the price of General Motors’ acquisition of Saab at that time, even considering Spyker cars in Amsterdam for more than a year. The growth of the secondary market of the Stock Exchange (26.34%) is still nearly 50 percentage points higher than the increase.

Chen Liang, an automotive analyst at Huatai Securities, said that once the high-premium purchase is established, the Sabine Vehicle will review the cross-border acquisitions given that Saab had previously "indefinitely suspended production." An auto industry analyst with a foreign brokerage firm pointed out that similar to Geely's acquisition of Volvo, the acquisition of an auto factory is not only focused on its production line and management capabilities, but also on its technology platform, brand equity, and cooperation with other parts companies. . "Compared with the financial crisis period, the auto market in the United States and other developed countries has recovered. Huatai should be optimistic about Saab's profitability in this area."

Cui Dongshu, deputy secretary-general of the China Passenger Cars Association, said on the 3rd that Saab's most critical task is to improve the entire operating system of the company, and at the same time it needs continuous capital injection. Only in this way can recovery be possible. There are also industry insiders that Huatai should not underestimate the follow-up capital investment in the Saab brand.

"GM has pumped out Saab's vehicle technology and Saab has become ill. Saab has dropped from the same level as Volvo to a small car company." Jia Xinguang, chief analyst of China Automotive Industry Consulting Development Corporation, said that Saab will expand into China in the future. The market is not optimistic. The Huatai acquisition plan is "not worth it." As of the end of this report, Zhang Ruijun and Sun Huaying, director of Huatai Motor Co., Ltd. all expressed their "unclear financial knowledge" regarding the acquisition of "high premium" and its potential risks, and Huatai Financial Department officials did not contact the newspaper as agreed.