EDP AGM chair to decide if China Three Gorges is limited to 25% vote in takeover approval - report (translated)
28 MAY 2018
Energias de Porgtugal [ELI:EDP] AGM chair Antonio Vitorino will decide on whether China ThreeGorges (CTG)'s voting rights are limited to 25% in an eventual approval of its takeover bid for the Portuguese utility, reported Expresso.
Sources said Vitorino, in his capacity as chair of the EDP AGM, will have to decide if CTG votes with the 28.25% held by Chinese state firms in EDP or is limited to 25% of voting rights. Another Chinese power group, CNIC owns an additional 4.98% of EDP to CTG’s 23.27% holding.
CTG has already requested that EDP statutes are altered to remove a 25% voting cap but the CTG bid to acquire the remaining shares in EDP is likely to end in legal deadlock, sources said. Vitorino has already been approached by other EDP shareholders to clarify what percentage of voting rights the Peoples Republic of China will have in the final vote tally to approve the takeover.
Whatever decision Vitorino takes as AGM chair is likely to be legally challenged by some EDP shareholders which will probably result in a legal deadlock to the CTG's EUR 3.26 a share bid which EDP has already deemed too low.
CTG’s preliminary offer has to be registered by the CMVM Portuguese Securities Commission by Friday 1 June. EDP will then have until June 8 to accept or reject the offer. The EDP board has reportedly recommended that CTG raises its offer to between EUR 3.6 and EUR 3.9 per share, the report said.
From print edition, P 2 (Economia)