Sources inform ''Globes'' that Ashdod Port Company Ltd. has picked the legal and accounting advisors who will prepare the company's prospectus for an issue of 15% of shares on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (TASE), just a month after the ministerial committee for privatization gave the final go-ahead for the ports privatization.
Ashdod Port selected law firms Eyal Khayat, Zolty, Neiger & Co. and Rosenberg, Hacohen, Goddard & Ephrat in a competitive process. The Government Companies Authority has approved the law firms, and picked a firm of its own to assist in the IPO, Gross, Kleinhendler, Hodak, Halevy Greenberg & Co.
The Haifa Port Company Ltd. has picked Fischer Behar Chen Well Orion as its advisor for the IPO.
The tender for the financial advisors is still underway. Five firms are participating. The ports companies demanded that the Government Companies Authority involve them in the selection of the legal advisors.
The IPOs of Ashdod Port Company and Haifa Port Company will likely be among the biggest and most interesting offerings on the TASE in 2010.
The structure of the ports' privatization is as follows. In the first stage, the Ashdod Port Company and Haifa Port Company will float 15% of their shares on the TASE, and the ports' employees will receive the option to buy 10% of the offerings (1.5% of each company) at a 30% discount. In the second stage, to take place in 2011, the government will sell on the TASE or to institutional investors an additional 34% of the two port companies, resulting in 49% of the companies going to private hands. The government will keep the 51% controlling interest in the two companies, and will have the exclusive right to appoint all their directors.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on October 6, 2009
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