Polish managers of a former state-owned company are receiving harsh lessons in capitalist reality. They are on the wrong end of the country's first hostile takeover bid, launched by a British firm with which they were in partnership talks less than a year ago. Worse, Poland's BIG Bank Gdanski, holder of 14% of the stock and a seat on the supervisory board, has not rallied to the target's defence and says it will sell at the best price.
"Our initial strategy was to sell, but not at Z10 ($2.80) [the offer price for paint-maker Polifarb Cieszyn Wroclaw, the target company]," says Jacek Dabrowsky, head of investor relations at BIG BG. "Low stock prices mean that we would lose a lot on Polifarb if we sold now, but it would be a profit with regard to our end-of-year figures as the cash provisions we had set aside for the stock would be released."
Polifarb's problems began when expected synergies from a high-profile merger in August 1997 did not come through. The market bid the share price as high as Z23 but it has since fallen back to a third of this. As a way out of the difficulties it held talks with UK coatings firm Kalon in April last year as a possible strategic partner.