Toyota's plan to take an affiliate private looked unremarkable at first. Instead, the bid for Toyota Industries, or TICO, ignited a battle between activist investors demanding top dollar and a Japanese corporate culture that prizes stakeholder harmony over shareholder returns.
This month, Toyota sweetened its bid by 15% to around $27.8 billion but failed to quell the uprising. Elliott Investment Management said the revised ?18,800-a-share offer undervalued TICO by almost 40% ¡ª and potentially much more as a standalone entity.
The U.S.-based activist fund, which holds 6.7% of TICO, has attacked the bid as opaque and said it falls short of basic governance standards. Since Toyota announced its initial ?16,300-a-share offer in June, Elliott has led the charge for a higher price.
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