LIBERTY Telecoms Holdings Inc. will bid goodbye to the stock exchange a month from now, following approval by its board of directors.
In a filing to the local bourse, the telco holding company’s legal counsel Maureen Christine Lizarondo said the board has reviewed its options with regard to the tender offer of its majority shareholder, and has decided to delist the company from the stock exchange by November 21.
“The board of directors evaluated the options available to the company in connection with the tender offer being conducted by its majority stockholder, Vega Telecom Inc., to all the minority shareholders of the company and considering the current public float of the company,” she said in the disclosure.
The newly acquired company of the telco duopoly offered to buy out the minority shareholders of Liberty at a price of P2.20 per share last month.
The tender offer for the 165.88-million common shares of Liberty represents 12.82 percent of the issued and outstanding stock of liberty, which was previously owned by San Miguel Corp. until PLDT Inc. and Globe Telecom Inc. purchased all of the food-to-infrastructure firm’s telco assets, one of which is Vega Telecom Inc.
To recall, Smart and Globe acquired San Miguel’s telco business for P69.1 billion on May 30. This transaction freed up the coveted 700-mega hertz frequency band, which according to the players is the key to improve the current state of the Internet in the Philippines.
It also gave them access to a swathe of frequencies previously held by the diversified conglomerate, which initially planned to launch a third-core player this year. The transaction also required Liberty to delist from the Philippine Stock Exchange.