Car retail company quits stock-market

A Portuguese car distribution and retail company that sold brands such as Volkswagen, Bentley and Lamborghini has given shareholders three months to liquidate their shares because it has abandoned the stock market.

SAG GEST – Soluções Automóvel Globais saw its turnover fall by €41 million in Q1 of 2019 to record a turnover of €116 million. Last year it had a turnover of €156 million for the same period. It brought total losses to €186 million for the company which is based near Lisbon.
In its company report (unaudited) for 2018, it stated that with the “worsening of liquidity risk, which resulted in a reduction of funds available to finance the temporary and seasonal needs of working capital, it was necessary to carry out in the 1st quarter of 2018 a set of punctual sales of used cars and self registration, which were in stock on December 31, 2017. The performance of these operations negatively affected the EBITDA of the Distribution area by approximately €6.0 million.”
SAG abandoned its listed status on the Portuguese stock market on Tuesday after the markets commission and supervisory authority CMVM approved the “loss in quality of the company”.
Investors that still hold shares in the company have three months to sell them with the right to 6.1 cents per share.
The request to quit the stock market was made by João Pereira Coutinho, CEO and the main shareholder of the company on 3 July after having taken control of 95.05% of the capital share following a Public Acquisition Offer (PAO) whose results were published on 1 July.
As a result of this withdrawal, the CMVM says that it is now the responsibility of IAMC – Investments & Assets Management Consulting, a company entirely, directly and indirectly controlled by João Pereira Coutinho – and also a SAG shareholder-, to acquire the shares still held by the remaining SAG shareholders.
The regulator adds that this acquisition will be made within “a three month period from the publication of the announcement and at a unit price of €0.0615 per share.”
The unit price corresponds to the counter offer offered in the PAO by João Pereira Coutinho launched at the end of April as part of the sale of SIVA to the Porsche group which served to guarantee the “continued operations” of the car importer and save 650 jobs in so doing. SIVA was sold for €1.
The EU Commission approved the sale of SIVA to Porsche Holding Salzburg (PHS) which was announced by João Pereira Coutinho following the restructuring of SAG whose net losses stood at €186 million by the end of 2018.