Lotte Corporation announced on the 26th that it sold 5,245,461 treasury shares to Lotte Property & Development through a block trade after market hours. The sale proceeds amounted to 144.8 billion KRW based on today's closing price.
As a result, Lotte Corporation's treasury shareholding ratio decreased by 5 percentage points, from 32.5% to 27.5%, and Lotte Property & Development secured a 5% stake in Lotte Corporation.
In its business report disclosed in March, Lotte Corporation stated that it was considering selling approximately 15% of its total issued shares in treasury stock to improve its financial structure and invest in new businesses.
At that time, Lotte Corporation designated the controlling shareholder and related parties as the targets for the treasury share sale. This was intended to minimize negative impacts on the market.
Even after this transaction, Lotte Corporation plans to pursue additional treasury share sales and is also considering retiring some shares to enhance shareholder value (value-up). Lotte Corporation also intends to actively increase its shareholder return ratio to over 35% by combining cash dividends and treasury share retirements.
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