Australia’s Telstra to sell major stake in China’s Autohome to Ping An Insurance for US$1.6b

Telstra Corp, Australia’s largest telecommunications company, has agreed to sell most of its stake in Autohome, China’s leading online car retail website operator, to Ping An Insurance for US$1.6 billion.

The deal announced on Friday has Ping An acquiring 47.7 per cent of the total issued shares in New York-traded Autohome, while Telstra retains a 6.5 per cent interest in the online business that it has owned since 2008.

“For the next phase of the company’s development, as Autohome moves away from being purely online to operating an offline sales platform in China, it will benefit from a strategic investor in Ping An which has expertise in car insurance and financing,” Telstra chief executive Andrew Penn said.

The sale price of US$29.55 per share reflected a premium of 12.7 per cent to Autohome’s volume-weighted average price over the past 60 days, according to Telstra.

“Autohome has been an excellent investment for Telstra and demonstrates the opportunities that exist in the Asia-Pacific region,” Penn said.

Beijing-based Autohome saw a 62.4 per cent jump in revenue last year to 3.46 billion yuan (HK$4.14 billion), up from 2.13 billion yuan in 2014, on the back of its strong advertising and car dealer subscription services sales.