After independence day,
the Malaysian economy remained dominated by former imperial power and
about 60% of Malaysia corporate assets were still owned by them such as
Guthrie Corporation Limited. GCL owned a plantation in Malaysia that had
increased to 194,000 acres of rubber, oil palm, cocoa and tea estates
which produced 80-90% of group profits in 1981. Earlier in the 1900s,
GCL was an agency house that managing agents of direct investments in
commodity production and in 1958, they oversaw 150,000 acres of planted
rubber, palm oil and tea, plus two tin mines estimated at 35 million
pounds (RM 300 million).
7 September 1981 at dawn - on the London Stock Exchange, GCL was taken over by Malaysian in less than four hours from 25% to more than 50% of the total shares and event is famously called ‘Dawn Raid’. Later, the Malaysianised GCL company was merged with Sime Darby and the name ‘Guthrie’ is no longer around.
Earlier
on 12 February 1980, there was first dawn raid by De Beers and it
contagiously set an example to another five cases involving this
Blitzkrieg-style operation. Then, Council for the Securities Industry
tightens the regulation with the application of the seven-day period (as
“stalling mechanism”) for the purchaser who was considering topping up
their acquisition of the target company exceeding the 30% limit. A year
before the raid of GCL, Khalid Ibrahim and his colleagues undertook two
factors to analyse: (1.) whether or not worthwhile to take over GCL and
at what price and (2.) the “tactical” means of pursuing this operation
after CSI had added obstruction to avoid similar incident as previous
six dawn raid style takeovers.
... I am excited for the movie to be out "Dawn Raid: The Hands That Rattled The Queen".
Reference: The
‘Unfinished Business’ of Malaysia’s Decolonisation: The Origins of the
Guthrie ‘Dawn Raid’ (by Shakila Yacob, University of Malaya &
Nicholas J. White, John Moores University)
Photo: (Right) With the Mastermind Tan Sri Dato' Seri Abdul Khalid Bin Ibrahim
No comments:
Post a Comment