S'pore govt buys Proton stake

S'pore govt buys Proton stake

KUALA LUMPUR: The Government of Singapore Investment Corp Pte Ltd (GIC) has emerged as a substantial shareholder in Malaysia's national car-maker Proton with a 5.04 percent stake, Proton Holdings said.

GIC owned 27.66 million shares in the company as of November 17, Proton said in a statement late on Tuesday.

The presence of GIC on the list of Proton shareholders signals that the national car-maker has regained foreign investors' confidence after Japan's Mitsubishi Motors Corp sold its 7.9 percent stake earlier this year, said an analyst at a local research house.

Set up in 1983 as part of Malaysia's drive into heavy industry, Proton used to sell six out of every 10 new cars in the country, but its market share fell to 49 percent in 2003 and has dipped further to 44.5 percent in the first eight months of this year. -- AFP