South Korea: Oriental Brewery denies reports of AB InBev’s plan to sell stake

South Korea’s Oriental Brewery on July 29 denied news reports that its parent Belgian company AB InBev is seeking to sell its majority stake, The Korea Herald reported on July 29.

According to local media reports, AB InBev - which acquired OB for $5.8 billion in 2014 - has been contacting local retail conglomerates such as Lotte and Shinsegae, as well as private equity funds via foreign securities companies to sell its stake. The deal could be worth some 9 trillion won ($7.65 billion).

But OB has flatly denied such reports, claiming that its CEO has made it clear that there are no plans to sell more assets.

“In a recent interview with the Financial Times, AB InBev CEO Carlos Brito said that the company has no plan for additional asset sales. (News reports) are just speculating, after AB InBev called off its plan to spin off Budweiser Brewing via a Hong Kong initial public offering earlier this month,” an OB official told The Korea Herald.

Market speculations have risen that AB InBev plans to sell its Asian business to secure more funds to reduce its $102.5 billion debt accumulated from its $100 billion-plus takeover of rival SABMiller in 2016.

Just days after AB InBev abandoned its Hong Kong listing plans, the company sold its Australian subsidiary Carlton & United Breweries to Japanese beer giant Asahi Group Holdings for $11.3 billion, which it said was “attractive valuation.”

In 1998, AB InBev acquired OB from Doosan Group but sold OB to private equity fund KKR in 2009 following the merger of InBev and Anheuser-Busch. But it bought OB back in 2014.

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