Wilhelmsen & HMM: MERGER IN THE ORIENT

On Friday the 22nd of February, Wilh. Wilhelmsen ASA asked the Oslo Stock Exchange to suspend trading awaiting an announcement. Rumours were buzzing around Oslo that weekend but three main theories appeared; i) the Wilhelmsen family had had enough of life in the public arena and would tender for the roughly 60% of the economics they did not own. ii) The initial talks with Hyundai Merchant Marine had been successful and a takeover of the ailing Korean shipowner’s car carrier fleet would move forward. iii) The Wallenius family was moving out of shipping and was selling their 50% stake in Wallenius Wilhelmsen (WW) to the Oslo listed company. Well it wasn’t the first and the third is still a possibility (we will come back to that a little later).

But the second one is now a reality. Representatives from Wilhelmsen and Wallenius are currently in Seoul, performing due diligence on HMM’s car carrier division.

In this article we will look at the rationale(s) for the buyer and seller to enter into these talks and why we feel that there is more to this story than first meets the eye. Before we take a look at the potential transaction let’s take a look at the players involved and see if we can easily spot the reasoning for such a deal.

This is only an excerpt of Wilhelmsen & HMM: MERGER IN THE ORIENT

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