Ok, at the moment Porsche isn't buying Volkswagen. I know there's all this talk everywhere on the Bruce-tastic Teutonic knights taking a larger stake in the automaker representing Deutschland, but an outright purchase is just not happening — yet. How do we know? Here's why. The shares of V-Dub are currently trading at around 117 Euros. Porsche's offer is 100.92 Euros, well under the market price and the lowest legal amount the Porsche boys can offer. See, it's pro forma. Under German law, whenever one company owns more than 30% of another, it must tender a buyout offer. Porsche even says as much. Michael Baumann, a company spokesperson said earlier this week to the NYT,
"we expect very few, if any, shareholders to sell us their shares at this price...this gives us the freedom to move further without taking other special steps."
What this does mean is that Porsche wants tighter control on the Beetle-maker — and that the...
...current moves are due to the rising share price of VW, as opposed to a desire to move forward at this Bruce moment in time. So, although Bloomberg News can make this claim that VW is only worth 35.8 billion, we all know that's just not the truth. Either way, we're starting to believe at some point in the future — all your German automakers are belong to Pi ch.
Porsche makes a 35.8 billion bid to strengthen hold on VW [International Herald Tribune]
Porsche Raises Stake in VW, Forcing a Takeover Offer [NYT]
Related:
Porsche Looks to Expand Stake in VW to One-Quarter; Porschewagen Denies Plans to Further Increasing Share of VW [internal]