【英语生活】保诚“头脑发热”

If Prudential's bid to acquire the Asian arm of AIG fails as a result of institutional hostility, the outcome will be supremely ironic. The Pru is, after all, the historic pioneer of shareholder activism in the UK, with a record of engaging with underperforming companies that goes back to the 1950s.

In those days it would have been unthinkable for fellow institutions to line up against each other in this way. So much the better that the governance climate is now less inhibited. Yet the question remains whether institutional pressure to prevent the Pru overpaying for AIA is well directed.

Institutional investors' record on big bids has not been good. Few objected to the disastrous deal in 1997 whereby Imperial Chemical Industries' acquisition of Unilever's speciality chemicals business brought Britain's leading manufacturer to its knees. Many were egging on the management of Marconi in its ill-judged and ill-financed acquisitions in the US in the late 1990s. There were not many objections either to Vodafone's mega-bid for Mannesmann in 2000, which destroyed shareholder value on a monumental scale.

More recently, big institutions worried intensely about the risk that Sir Fred Goodwin, chief executive of Royal Bank of Scotland, would succumb to hubris and launch an over-ambitious takeover. Yet when it came to a vote, they backed him on the catastrophic bid for ABN Amro, even though the credit crunch was already crippling the financial system and ABN Amro had sold its North American crown jewels. And then they backed Lloyds TSB in its ill-fated bid for HBOS.

Note, that this is not a peculiarly British problem. The AOL-Time Warner merger contains plenty of salutary lessons, as does the ruinous acquisition spree conducted by Vivendi Universal under Jean-Marie Messier.

That said, it is worth remembering that the Pru has had a way over the years of falling for the investment fads of the day when euphoria has been in the air. In the 1970s it provided major backing for fringe banks such as UDT, Keyser Ullmann and Dalton Barton, which collapsed with huge losses. In the 1980s it plunged into estate agency when the housing market was bubbling up, only to exit the business amid a wash of red ink. And in the 1990s it joined the herd in mis-selling scandals which brought heavy regulatory censure down on its head.

The China story that drives the bid for AIA all too suspiciously fits this pattern. The risk in financing the bid would have been less than with Marconi or ICI. Yet the price always looked excessive; the forecasts that supported the price appeared so heady as to be implausible; the fees to the advisers were outrageous; and the implementation risk looked formidable, especially in the light of the Financial Times' reports of AIA top managers' planning to depart if the takeover went ahead. Cross-border acquisitions are the most difficult to pull off, especially where the target is so large in relation to the bidder.

After the serious mistakes over the recent RBS and Lloyds bids, there is admittedly a risk that the institutions will now be too restrictive in looking at large takeovers, not least because they are in the political spotlight as never before. They also have to be conscious that the issues in takeovers are often complex. It is hard enough for non-executive directors to second guess executives on major strategic investments. For shareholders, who have less information, voting against the board is doubly difficult. They have to tread carefully before seeking to counter executives' strategic moves.

The fact that the institutions have made their antagonism to the Pru's vaulting ambition in Asia so clear nonetheless suggests they believe the issues in this particular transaction are not all that complex. And they are right: the risks are clearly excessive at the price the Pru was intending to pay.

Given the regularity with which ill-judged takeovers have destroyed some of Britain's biggest and best companies, there is a need for more restraint in the workings of the market in corporate control. Golden parachutes, may have gone in the UK, but the structure of many incentive schemes still encourages executives to go for a short-term killing. Fee-hungry investment bankers will always be on hand to explain why a giant takeover provides the strategic solution. From the chief executive's point of view, the thrill of the takeover chase is also more fun than the hard grind of raising operational performance. A bias towards restraint is therefore a bias in the right direction.

A final irony here is that incrementalism has served the Pru well so far in Asia. It timed its build-up there before the China story became tinged with euphoria and the prospects of the existing business remain attractive. So there is an acceptable Plan B. If the Pru has to fall back on that, thank goodness for shareholder activism. The writer is an FT columnist

英国保诚集团(Prudential)收购美国国际集团(AIG)亚洲业务友邦保险(AIA)的交易因为机构的反对而失败，具有非常大的讽刺意味。毕竟，保诚在历史上是英国股东维权行动的先锋，与表现不佳公司交涉的记录可追溯至上世纪50年代。

当时，各机构以这种方式彼此唱反调是不可想象的。更好的是，目前的治理氛围不那么受约束。然而问题仍然在于，机构为阻止保诚溢价收购友邦而施压是否有道理。

机构投资者在大型交易中的记录一向不佳。很少有人反对1997年帝国化学工业(ICI)对联合利华(Unilever)专用化学品业务的灾难性的收购，这宗交易压垮了ICI这家英国领先企业。上世纪90年代末，许多机构鼓动马可尼(Marconi)管理层在美国进行判断失当、资金不足的收购。2000年，沃达丰(Vodafone)巨资收购曼内斯曼(Mannesmann)时，也没有很多人反对——该交易极大地破坏了股东价值。

更近一些时候，大型机构强烈担心下列风险，即苏格兰皇家银行(RBS)首席执行官弗雷德?古德温爵士(Sir Fred Goodwin)将会过分自傲，发起过于野心勃勃的收购。然而在投票时，它们支持了古德温对荷兰银行(ABN Amro)的灾难性收购，即使信贷危机已经在冲击金融体系，而且荷兰银行已卖掉其在北美的“皇冠上的宝石”。随后它们又支持了劳埃德TSB银行(Lloyds TSB)对苏格兰哈里法克斯银行(HBOS)时运不佳的收购。

需要指出的是，这不是英国特有的问题。美国在线-时代华纳(AOL Time Warner)的合并包含了大量有益的教训，让-马利?梅西耶(Jean-Marie Messier)领导的维旺迪环球(Vivendi Universal)进行的破坏性的连环收购也是如此。

话说回来，值得记住的是，从历史上看，保诚往往在市场牛气十足的时候，爱上当时的时髦投资。上世纪70年代，保诚向UDT、Keyser Ullmann和Dalton Barton等边缘银行提供了重大支持，但这些银行最终都因巨额亏损而倒闭。上世纪80年代，在房地产市场升温的时候，保诚投身于房地产经纪公司，结果只是在遭受严重亏损后退出该业务。上世纪90年代，它陷入不当销售丑闻，招致了严厉的监管批评。

推动收购友邦的“中国故事”，令人生疑地符合这种模式。为收购进行融资的风险将比不上马可尼或帝国化学工业公司。然而收购价格从一开始就看似过高；支持收购价格的增长预测看起来迅猛得有些不真实；顾问费高得离谱；而且实施风险看起来也非常可怕，尤其是鉴于英国《金融时报》关于友邦最高管理层计划在收购成功后辞职的报道。跨境收购是最难完成的，尤其是相对收购方而言，目标非常巨大的时候。

在近年苏格兰皇家银行和劳埃德TSB银行收购犯下严重错误之后，应该承认存在这样一种风险，即机构目前在考虑大型收购时可能过于谨慎，尤其是因为它们在政治上受到前所未有的关注。它们还必须意识到，收购事宜往往很复杂。让非执行董事揣测高管的重大战略投资就够难了，对信息更少的股东而言，投票反对董事会更是难上加难。他们不得不在设法反对高管的战略举措之前谨慎行事。

然而，机构如此旗帜鲜明地反对保诚在亚洲的过分抱负表明，他们相信，这宗交易所涉及的问题并不那么复杂。他们是正确的：按保诚打算支付的价格衡量，风险显然过大。

鉴于判断失当的收购已经多次摧毁英国一些最大最好的企业，有必要从企业控制上对市场活动施加更多限制。“金色降落伞”条款可能在英国已经消失，但许多激励方案在结构上仍鼓励高管追逐短期荣耀。渴望赚取费用的投资银行家，总会愿意解释一宗庞大收购交易为何提供了战略解决方案。从首席执行官的角度看，收购行动带来的兴奋也比提高经营业绩的辛苦更加有趣。因此向限制倾斜的方向是正确的。

在这方面，具有讽刺意味的最后一点是，迄今为止，渐进主义让保诚在亚洲受益匪浅。它在中国题材变得狂热之前就构建了业务，而现有业务的前景仍具吸引力。因此，可接受的B计划是存在的。如果保诚不得不依赖该计划，那就是多亏了股东维权主义。

本文作者是英国《金融时报》专栏作家

译者/君悦