San Miguel Corp. has almost halved he size of its food unit’s share sale to $920million due to unfavorable stock market conditions as a consequence of trade tensions between the United States and several Asian countries above all China.
Last year San Miguel announced plans to combine its San Miguel Pure Foods, San Miguel Brewery and Ginebera San Miguel businesses in a new unit called San Miguel Food & Beverages (SMFB). (inside.beer, 7.11.2017). Due to public ownership rules in the Philippines and in order to achieve regulatory approval, the company was forced to broaden its ownership structure. On August 9, 2018, the board of directors of the corporation approved the sale of up to 1.2bn common shares of SMFB through a public offering in what could be the country’s biggest share sale on record. (inside.beer 15.8.2018)
In a regulatory filing to the stock exchange on Thursday, the food unit said San Miguel is seeking now to sell only 43,6% of the approved shares, totaling 523 million shares in a price range of 85 to 95 pesos per share. The proceeds will therefore be reduced to about 47,000 million pesos (US$920m).
Since July 1998, Eduardo M. Cojuangco Jr. is chairman of San Miguel Corporation. The multi-billionaire was a close adviser and personal friend to former Philippine president Ferdinand E. Marcos and is currently the chairman emeritus of the Nationalist People's Coalition, the party he founded in 1992.
In January 1999, Ramón S. Ang was elected vice-chairman of the company, a function he holds now for nearly 20 years.
