DEALS
Zhong Lun Advises Datang Power on the Privatization of Yitai Coal's H Shares Listed in HK
Zhong Lun Advises Datang Power on the Privatization of Yitai Coal's H Shares Listed in HK
On August 7, 2023, Inner Mongolia Yitai Coal Co., Ltd. (“Yitai Coal", stock code 3948.HK) published its announcement on the official website of The Stock Exchange of Hong Kong Limited (the “Stock Exchange"), announcing that as at 4:00 p.m. (Hong Kong time) on Monday, August 7, 2023, valid acceptance of Yitai Coal’s H share buy-back offer in respect of its 324,739,218 H shares had been received, representing approximately 99.61% of its H shares held by the independent H shareholders (being the total number of H shares in issue) and 9.98% of the total issued share capital of Yitai Coal. The listing of Yitai Coal’s H shares on the Stock Exchange was withdrawn with effect from 4:00 p.m. on Friday, August 11, 2023.
The offer price of the Yitai Coal’s H share buy-back offer was HK$17.50 per H share, and the total consideration for the valid acceptance exceeded HK$5.6 billion.
Zhong Lun acted as the Hong Kong legal adviser to Datang International Power Generation Co., Ltd. (“Datang Power", stock code 0991.HK), being one of Yitai Coal’s substantial H shareholders, in the above transaction. Immediately before this transaction, Datang Power, through its wholly-owned Hong Kong subsidiary, held 36,062,200 H shares in Yitai Coal, representing 11.06% of the total issued H shares in Yitai Coal.
Datang Power was established in 1994 and a sino-foreign joint venture controlled by China Datang Corporation Ltd. It was the first Chinese enterprise listed in London, the first Chinese power enterprise listed in Hong Kong and the first Chinese enterprise triple listed in Hong Kong, London and Shanghai. Datang Power is one of the largest independent power generation companies in China. After 28 years of development, its operating subsidiaries and projects under construction have spread across 19 provinces and regions across the country, and now it has developed into a large-scale comprehensive energy listed company in terms of green and low-carbon, multiple energy complementarity and high efficiency and coordination.
Yitai Coal was founded in 1997 and a large energy enterprise mainly producing, transporting, and selling coal and engaged in railway transport and coal-to-liquids industries. Yitai Coal owned or controlled by shareholding a total of 10 mechanized coal mines and is a core member of Inner Mongolia Yitai Group Co. Ltd., which ranked the first among Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region’s top 50 coal enterprises and was listed by the State Council as one of 14 large coal base backbone enterprises on the list of the planning and construction of China. Yitai Coal was listed on Shanghai Stock Exchange in 1997 where its shares were referred to as “Yitai B Shares (stock code 900948)" and was listed on the Stock Exchange in 2012. Immediately before this transaction, Yitai Coal had 326,007,000 H shares in issue, representing 10.02% of its total issued share capital.
This project was led by equity partner Jaycen Liao and non-equity partner Jihai Xia. Team members also included partner Jie Shi and associates Jacob Chun, Yonghao Dong, Bingxin Zhang and Jenny Lai.
