Congratulations are in order. The Taiwan government last week successfully unloaded 12 per cent of its shares in incumbent phone company Chunghwa Telecom.
This column has in the past noted the regularity with which the government - specifically the Ministry of Transportation and Communications - has tried and failed, and tried again to sell its stake in Chunghwa.
In 2001, the government pledged to privatise the operator by the end of that year. It failed miserably. It renewed the vow this year. So forgive those of us who chortled a little and wondered aloud about the prospects for achieving it this time around.
But on July 17 in New York they made a big step forward when the ticker code CHT was added to the board of the New York Stock Exchange at US$14.24. The sale of the American depositary shares - each of which represents 10 ordinary shares - takes the government shareholding to under 70 per cent, giving them a reasonable chance of getting the privatisation completed on schedule. The key once again will be price. This time, the sale went through at a mere 1.8 per cent discount to the closing price the day prior to listing. Analysts had speculated the discount could be as much as 10 per cent.
The success is significant because not only did the government get the sale it so desperately needed at a reasonable price, it also appears that both the seller and the market have found a mutually agreeable price.
That fact augurs well for future sales, but may be dampened by the possibility that the market has taken its fill of Chunghwa for the near future.