LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--City of London Investment Management Company Limited (“CLIM”) publishes on their website (https://citlon.com/esg-clients) today a letter sent to the Chairman of the Board of Samsung C&T Corporation (“Samsung C&T” or the “Company”) detailing proposals for a 2023 dividend of KRW 4,500 per ordinary share (2022: KRW 2,300) and a KRW 500 billion share buyback programme to run until the end of 2024. CLIM intends to submit these proposals for shareholder consideration at the Company’s 2024 Annual General Meeting.
CLIM first invested in Samsung C&T in 2017 and regularly engages with the Company’s representatives, including members of the Board of Directors. While CLIM often prefers to conduct these discussions in private, there has been insufficient progress towards improving shareholder value in response to:
1) the decrease in share price post-merger,
2) the significant long-term share price underperformance, and
3) the unacceptably wide discount to intrinsic value.
Since the merger of Cheil Industries Inc. and Samsung C&T completed (September 15, 2015) to October 31, 2023, the Company’s share price total return was -25.3%, an underperformance relative to the KOSPI Index of 64 percentage points. As at October 31, 2023, CLIM estimates that the share price discount to intrinsic value exceeded 66%, representing a shareholder value deficit of over KRW 34 trillion (US$25 billion).
About CLIM
CLIM is a UK headquartered asset management firm, established in 1991. CLIM is a long-term investor in global markets via closed-end funds and other securities using a value based approach exploiting anomalies between price and intrinsic value. CLIM has a strong focus on corporate governance and regularly engages with portfolio companies to enhance shareholder value.