Korea Line is left out from Hahn & Company

Hahn & Company gave up on a takeover deal for Korea Line on February 14th. Hahn & Company is a Korean private equity investment firm that makes corporate acquisitions and investments.

The foreign contingent liabilities have been exposed in the process of asset disposition and the company considered it as an impediment for the acquisition.

As Hahn & Company abandoned the acquisition, the disposal issue of Korea Line went back to square one.

From the outset, Korea Line has been somewhat in disfavor among market participants - only 2 financial investors participated in a tender on January 21st. For this reason the junior negotiator could not be chosen.

Meanwhile, some analysts have reasoned that it is not very easy to move forward with another takeover plan as there are no suitable candidates.

CJ Group, which was highly acclaimed early on as an effective candidate, withdrew from bidding due to being on bad terms with Posco. Posco is the biggest account for Korea Line.

SK Group has also withdrawn as the company is currently in turmoil. Mr. Choi Tae-Won, the president of SK Group, is under court custody for embezzlement. As a result SK Group went back to the drawing board with a takeover plan for STX PanOcean. At present, the group cannot consider Korea Line.

Korea Line is set to be delisted on account of non-occurrence of sale. On February 25th, Korea Line announced its total ownership interest was - KRW 184.8 billion in 2012. For this loss the carrier faced the impairment of capital, which could be an additional reason for delisting. As such, the carrier will be delisted if it cannot prove the settlement of the impairment of capital by April 1st. < 김보람 기자 brkim@ksg.co.kr >