By undertaking its first buyback in about 2½-years, CK Asset is hoping to boost a share price that has slumped more than 16% since the start of 2019, compared with an 8% rise in the benchmark Hang Seng Index.
Hong Kong billionaire Li Kashing and his eldest son Victor Li are stepping up efforts to boost the stock of family business CK Asset Holdings, after HK$4.4 billion ($760 million) of personal purchases of the company’s shares failed to reverse slumping prices.
Li’s charity, the Li Ka Shing Foundation, is selling four companies holding stakes in infrastructure operations in the UK and the Netherlands, to CK Asset, for HK$17 billion in stock. To avoid diluting current shareholders, the company will buy back the same amount of shares from the market at an 8.4% premium to the previous closing price.
