[Special Stock] Hanwha's Third Son Declares 'Public Tender Offer', Hanwha Galleria Up Limit↑

Kim Dong-seon, the third son of Hanwha Group Chairman Kim Seung-yeon and Vice President in charge of Hanwha Galleria Future Vision, has launched a public tender offer for Hanwha Galleria shares, causing Hanwha Galleria Preferred Shares and Hanwha Galleria common shares to surge strongly.

As of 9:06 a.m. on the 23rd, Hanwha Galleria Preferred Shares (Hanwha Galleria-u) hit the upper price limit. On the Korea Exchange, they are trading at 3,130 KRW, up 720 KRW (29.88%) from the previous trading day. Hanwha Galleria common shares are also trading at 1,539 KRW, up 236 KRW (18.11%) from the previous trading day.

Hanwha Galleria announced that Vice President Kim will conduct a public tender offer to purchase 34 million common shares at 1,600 KRW per share from the 23rd until next month 11th.

The purchase price of 1,600 KRW per share represents a premium of about 34% compared to Hanwha Galleria’s recent one-month average closing price of 1,190 KRW, and about 23% higher than the previous day’s closing price of 1,303 KRW.

The premium is known to be the highest level among public tender offers conducted in the domestic stock market within the last three years.

To finance this public tender offer, Vice President Kim secured a stock-backed loan of approximately 54.4 billion KRW from Korea Securities Finance, using about 1.26 million Hanwha common shares he owns as collateral as of the previous day.

The 34 million shares Kim plans to purchase through the tender offer represent 17.5% of the total common shares. If the tender offer succeeds, Kim’s stake in Hanwha Galleria will increase from the current 2.3% to 19.8%.

Currently, the largest shareholder of Hanwha Galleria is Hanwha with a 36.31% stake, followed by Vice President Kim with 2.32% as the second-largest shareholder, and Hanwha Solutions holding 1.39% as the third-largest shareholder.

Since Galleria was spun off from Hanwha Solutions and newly listed in March last year, Vice President Kim began acquiring shares starting with 50,000 shares in April last year and has purchased company shares 137 times until May this year, before launching this large-scale public tender offer.

Hanwha Galleria explained that Vice President Kim initiated the large-scale share purchase to enhance corporate value and demonstrate a strong commitment to responsible management, judging that the company is in a crisis due to poor performance.