Government sells 100m shares in Indofood

Government sells 100m shares in Indofood

JAKARTA (JP): The government has sold 100 million shares, or
53.76 percent of its total stake, in the publicly listed instant
noodle maker PT Indofood Sukses Makmur for Rp 5,000 each, a
senior government official said.

Sofyan Djalil, a communications assistant to State Minister of
the Empowerment of State Enterprises Tanri Abeng, said in a press
release on Thursday that the transaction, which was made on
Wednesday, represented a 14 percent premium on the average price
over the past month.

He said that the deal was brokered by Jardine Fleming.

He added that a total of six international securities firms,
including ABN Amro, ING Barings, Credit Lyonnais, Goldman Sachs,
and Merill Lynch, had been invited to join the tender process for
the divestment.

Before the sale, the government owned 186 million shares in
the noodle company, representing 10.18 percent of the company's
total shares.

The government now owns 86 million shares in Indofood,
representing 4.72 percent of the company's total shares, and will
only sell its remaining shares at the "best price", Sofyan said.

Indofood share prices closed lower at Rp 4,900 on Wednesday,
down from it Tuesday close of Rp 5,000.

Indofood is the world's largest instant noodle maker and one
of Asia's most prominent food manufacturers. The company is 62.66
percent controlled by the Salim Group, Indonesia's largest
conglomerate.

The group announced in the middle of last month that Japan's
Nissin Food Corp and Hong Kong's First Pacific Group had agreed
to purchase its 60 percent stake in Indofood for US$570 million,
or Rp 3,950 per share.

A few days after the deal was announced, Tanri said that the
government would only divest its stake in Indofood at a higher
price than that offered to the Salim Group.

Analysts described the sale of the Salim Group's shares in
Indofood to foreign-based companies as a strategy by the group's
chairman to stave off a possible future seizure of his assets
because of the increasing public demand to investigate instances
of corruption, collusion and nepotism by businessmen during the
Soeharto regime.

The chairman of the Salim Group, Liem Sioe Liong, is a close
friend of Soeharto. (rei)