【英语财经】中国企业：并购交易的不速之客 Anbang’s Starwood bid shines light on China’s deal gate-crashers

Anbang Insurance’s $13bn bid for Starwood Hotel & Resorts makes it the latest in a string of Chinese companies which have sought to gate-crash high profile deals.

In this case, Anbang is seeking to outbid hotels chain Marriott and launch what would be the biggest takeover yet of a US company by a Chinese group.

Since January, Chinese companies have also taken shots at buying Swiss agrochemical business Syngenta and two US groups, crane maker Terex and Fairchild Semiconductor.

Overseas spending by Chinese buyers this year has already reached $102bn, according to Dealogic — just shy of last year’s record of $106bn.

Anbang has been part of that dealmaking binge. News of the unlisted Chinese insurer’s bid for Starwood, which owns the Sheraton, St Regis and W hotel chains, came just a day after Anbang agreed to pay $6.5bn for another major US leisure company, Strategic Hotels & Resorts.

Before its $2bn purchase of the historic Waldorf Astoria hotel in New York in 2014, Anbang was little known outside of China. Since then the group, which has strong links to the Chinese government, has moved to the forefront of Chinese outbound acquisitions, with $23bn in deals.

The latest bid has added recognisable names to Anbang’s side. The group’s partners in the consortium are JC Flowers and China’s Primavera Capital Group, one person involved in the bidding process said. Primavera was founded by Fred Hu, who formerly led Goldman Sachs’ operations in China.

Starwood has not publicly identified Anbang as the bidder but has said the unsolicited offer valued its shares at $76 each. That is well above the present value of Marriott’s cash and stock offer, which has fallen to about $63.74 since the bid was announced in November.

Marriott said on Monday it was still committed to closing the deal with Starwood. Anbang did not respond to a request for comment on the deal.

Bankers said the counterbid for Starwood underscored the enthusiasm of some Chinese bidders for going after companies that were already in play, thus far with limited success.

ChemChina’s $44bn takeover of Syngenta in March put an end to months of uncertainty for the agribusiness, which had been the target of an unsolicited takeover by Monsanto.

But Chinese heavy equipment maker Zoomlion’s January approach for Terex has not gone as well. Terex has said that it intends to complete a $3.2bn deal with a Finnish group, although it has also entered into negotiations with Zoomlion.

In February, Fairchild Semiconductor rejected a $2.6bn bid from a consortium of Chinese investors that sought to upend an earlier offer from a US group. Fairchild took the lower offer, citing regulatory concerns.

“Interesting that every deal is one where someone else already bid or just bought. Like they need the validation another buyer gives to get comfort,” said one senior deal banker in Hong Kong, noting that an Anbang deal for Starwood would likely rely heavily on the due diligence carried out by Marriott.

Anbang’s dealmaking process is seen as highly secretive, in part because it often strikes deals without hiring a host of outside bankers. Instead it has built its own finance team staffed by bankers plucked from global banks during the past two years.

The in-house team at the company does much of the due diligence, valuation and finance work for deals, and boasts experienced bankers from Barclays, HSBC and Macquarie.

The group’s two hotel deals in two days suggests that Anbang’s M&A team had been waiting for a moment when the value of the renminbi was increasing against the dollar before springing on deals that could be executed in a hurry, said Keith Pogson, a senior partner at EY.

The renminbi hit a year-to-date high on Sunday, trading at Rmb6.45 to the dollar, up from Rmb6.59 at the end of February.

“They’re saying: ‘Now is the time. I can jump into this asset quickly,’” said Mr Pogson. “The renminbi is up at the moment but we don’t know where it’s going to be in a few months’ time.”

Sale of wealth management products likely to finance ￡13bn bid

Anbang’s $13bn bid for Starwood Hotels is likely to be financed by cash earned from the insurer’s sale of wealth management products (WMPs), writes Yuan Yang.

Along with many other Chinese insurers, Anbang has been offering retail customers interest rates of around 4-6 per cent if they agree to put their savings into “universal credit” WMPs for three to five years.

Research from ICBC International shows that Ping An, one of China’s “Big Five” insurers, more than doubled its exposure to such “alternative investments” from 2013-2015.

This new source of investor money leaves insurance companies cash-rich but also needing to make investments that support such high returns. Premiums for Anbang’s universal products grew 323 per cent in the first 11 months of 2015 compared with the year before, to Rmb38bn ($5.8bn).

Anbang and other midsized insurers have been looking particularly to overseas investments, in part because they are shut out of some large domestic options, and because of fears of further renminbi depreciation and falling local share prices.

“Bigger insurers with good government connections can get past the regulatory hurdles to invest in state-sponsored projects in China,” explains Grace Zhou of ICBC International.

Regulatory reform in the Chinese insurance sector could also make owning whole companies more attractive than buying shares, says Ms Zhou.

The China Risk Oriented Solvency System is due to be implemented this year, and regulators are considering treating assets held as equity investments as roughly twice as risky as assets held as wholly-owned companies.

安邦保险(Anbang)130亿美元收购喜达屋酒店及度假村集团(Starwood Hotels & Resorts)的交易，令其成为一连串试图强行闯入高调交易的中国企业中的最新一员。

在这笔交易中，安邦正寻求以更高的报价击退连锁酒店万豪国际(Marriott International)，发起迄今中国企业对美国企业的最大一笔收购。

自今年1月以来，中国企业已尝试收购以下几家企业：瑞士农业化工集团先正达(Syngenta)，以及两家美国企业——起重机制造商特雷克斯(Terex)和飞兆半导体(Fairchild Semiconductor)。

根据Dealogic的数据，今年中国买家在海外的支出已达1020亿美元，仅比去年1060亿美元的纪录略低一点。

在这波并购交易狂潮中，安邦一直参与其中。就在安邦向喜达屋发出收购要约的消息出现一天前，这家未上市的中国保险公司刚刚同意支付65亿美元收购另一家美国重要酒店集团Strategic Hotels & Resorts。喜达屋拥有喜来登(Sheraton)、瑞吉(St Regis)和W酒店(W Hotels)等品牌。

2014年，安邦以20亿美元收购了历史悠久的纽约华尔道夫酒店(Waldorf Astoria hotel)。在这笔收购之前，安邦的名头在海外并不响亮。在那之后，这家与中国政府有紧密联系的企业站到了中国海外并购潮的前排，交易金额已达230亿美元。

在最新这笔对喜达屋的收购中，安邦争取到了一些知名企业作自己的竞购伙伴。据参与投标过程的一位人士透露，安邦在这个竞购财团中的合作伙伴是JC Flowers和中国春华资本集团(Primavera Capital Group)。春华资本创始人胡祖六(Fred Hu)曾领导高盛(Goldman Sachs)的在华业务。

喜达屋还没有公开确认安邦为竞购者，但已表示这一不请自来的要约相当于将喜达屋的股票估值为每股76美元。这一报价远高于万豪现金加股票要约现在的价值，万豪的报价自去年11月宣布以来，已跌至相当于每股约63.74美元。

万豪在周一表示，它仍致力于完成与喜达屋的交易。安邦没有回应对这笔交易置评的请求。

银行业人士表示，对喜达屋的竞争性收购报价凸显出，部分中国买家多么热衷于追逐那些已经在交易中的企业，到目前为止这些尝试取得的成果有限。

今年3月，中国化工(ChemChina)以440亿美元收购先正达，为数月来围绕这家农业综合企业的不确定性画上了句号。此前先正达一直是孟山都(Monsanto)主动收购的目标。

但中国重型设备制造商中联重科(Zoomlion)今年1月与特雷克斯(Terex)的接触就没这么顺利了。特雷克斯已表示打算接受一家芬兰公司32亿美元的报价，但它也与中联重科展开了谈判。

今年2月，飞兆半导体拒绝了中国投资者组成的财团发出的26亿美元的报价，这一报价曾试图压倒一家美国公司更早的报价。飞兆以监管方面的顾虑为由，接受了那个较低的报价。

香港一位从事并购业务的资深银行业人士表示：“有趣的是，这些交易每笔都是别人已经出价或刚刚达成收购协议。就好像他们需要有另一个买家的确认才能心安。”他指出，安邦收购喜达屋的交易，可能会在很大程度上依赖于万豪做过的尽职调查。

安邦的交易磋商过程在外界看来非常神秘，部分原因在于该公司往往不从外面聘请大量银行家就敲定交易。相反，安邦打造了自己的金融团队，团队成员都是在过去两年间从跨国银行挖来的银行家。

安邦自己的这个团队负责为该公司的交易进行大部分尽职调查、估值及融资工作，它拥有多名曾就职于巴克莱(Barclays)、汇丰(HSBC)及麦格理(Macquarie)的经验丰富的银行家。

安永(EY)高级合伙人包凯(Keith Pogson)表示，安邦两天内相继宣布两笔酒店交易表明，在上马这些可能会匆忙执行的交易之前，该公司的并购团队一直在等待这样一个时刻：人民币相对美元在升值的时刻。

上周日，人民币汇率创下了今年以来的新高，从2月底的1美元兑6.59元人民币升至1美元兑6.45元人民币。

“他们说：‘现在是时候了。我可以迅速入手这笔资产。’”包凯说，“人民币目前涨起来了，但我们不知道几个月后汇率会如何。”

理财产品的销售很可能会为这笔130亿美元的收购交易提供资金

安邦收购喜达屋所需的130亿美元资金很可能将来自这家保险公司的理财产品销售收入。

与其他许多中国保险公司一样，安邦一直在向零售客户提供约4%至6%的利率，只要客户同意将自己的积蓄投入3至5年期保险理财产品。

工银国际(ICBC International)的研究显示，2013年至2015年，中国“五大”保险公司之一的平安保险(Ping An)，将其对这一“另类投资”的敞口扩大了一倍多。

这一投资资金新来源令保险公司现金充裕，但同时也需要进行投资以支撑如此高的回报率。2015年前11个月，安邦投资型产品的保费收入同比增长了323%，至380亿元人民币（合58亿美元）。

安邦及其他中等规模的保险公司一直特别重视海外投资，部分原因在于国内一些大型项目将他们排除在外，还有部分原因在于它们担忧人民币进一步贬值以及国内股价下跌。

工银国际的Grace Zhou解释说：“与政府关系较好的大型保险公司能够越过监管障碍，投资得到政府支持的国内项目。”

Grace Zhou说，中国保险行业的监管改革可能也让购买整家公司比买入股份更具吸引力。

中国风险导向的偿付能力体系(China Risk Oriented Solvency System)今年正式实施。监管机构正在考虑，将以股权投资方式持有的资产的风险，视作以全资所有企业方式持有的资产的大约两倍。

译者/何黎