Is this it? part II

Investors in Hong Kong and mainland Chinese stocks have been waiting a long time for the market to stop falling. In April we saw the beginnings of a tentative rebound, spurred by the announcement of shareholder-friendly reforms by the China Securities Regulatory Commission and positive macro / earnings headlines, but hopes were dashed soon after as the rally lost steam. ... more

Value-up index announced

Korea Exchange released the details of its long-awaited Korea Value-up index.

As expected, not one non-financial holding company was included in the index, although many listed subsidiaries were. This was not a surprise to us, as we have not seen wholehearted participation in Corporate Value-up (CVU) by any of the nonfinancial holding companies with the exception of LG Corp. We expect this to change over time following pressure by investors, regulators and the stock exchange. ... more

Gentle persuasion

Korea continues to be a key focus. Foreign investors are still generally quite sceptical on the prospects for the Value-up programme, with fewer than 30% expecting it to have a meaningful impact Principal reasons are the perceived inability of the government to pass legislation due to its minority position combined with the structural impediment of an equity market dominated by majority shareholders that seemingly don’t care about share prices. ... more

Round two

Following a period where the Korean “Corporate Value-Up” (CVU) beneficiaries retreated to below start-of-year levels, effectively pricing in a zero chance of success, the group staged a tentative, partial rebound in July (figure 1), potentially marking the start of “Round two”. ... more

India annual price discovery and Korea update

Following a draft proposal released in April, India’s market regulator SEBI recently finalised a market reform aimed at enhancing price discovery and liquidity for the nearly 70 holding companies listed on the country’s stock exchanges. ... more

Round trip, complete

It is rare to see a prominent investment theme go from zero to one hundred and back to zero again in the space of a few months. However, that is the story of Korea’s “Corporate Value Up” (CVU) initiative in 2024. ... more

A large retracement

Investors are less optimistic about the Korea Corporate Value-up program: ... more

Corporate Value-up

The Financial Services Commission (FSC) in Korea recently released  the “Corporate Value-up Program”. Some highlights: ... more

Where we stand

We present an update of the value vs. growth draw-down chart featured in past newsletters. ... more

Naming and shaming

November brought seven management buyout (MBO) announcements in Japan – the most in twelve years (figure 1). We last wrote about Japanese tender offers (including MBOs) in our January newsletter (Vigilance is Required, 3 February 2023). At the time, we identified two medium-term catalysts behind the trend: