Negotiations to sell HMM, South Korea’s flag carrier, appear to have stalled. The state-owned creditors Korea Development Bank (KDB) and Korea Ocean Business Co (KOBC) and the potential buyer and preferred bidder, the Harim Group, have failed to reach an agreement due to a substantial disagreement over certain details.
Negotiations for the acquisition of 57.9% of the shares held by KDB and KOBC were supposed to successfully wrapped up by February 6th.
Among the issues that contributed to the failure of the agreement were possible disagreements related to management rights and the deadline for transferring shares.
According to Lloyd’s List, the company that now controls the Korean company Pan Ocean, and which teamed up with a local private equity fund to make the bid, wanted full management control while the two public creditors would have preferred to continue monitoring the company.
Translation by Giles Foster
