Food major Kido sells 22.5 million treasury shares to foreign firm

Kido will sell more than 22.5 million treasury shares to a multinational consumer goods corporation which can help the group expand its export.

Tran Le Nguyen, vice chairman and general director of Kido, shared the information at the Vietnamese group's extraordinary general meeting of shareholders on Tuesday, but did not disclose the foreign firm's name.

"Kido Group expects to not only sell more products domestically but also bring products to the international market,” he said.

At the meeting, Kido's shareholders approved the proposal to buy back 10 million shares, accounting for 3.57% of the total issued shares, to reduce the firm's charter capital according to regulations.

This transaction is expected to be implemented in 2023 through order matching or agreement. If the transaction is successful, KDC's charter capital will be reduced to VND2,697 billion ($113.48 million). The number of outstanding shares will then be 269.7 million and the number of treasury shares, zero.

Sharing about the business strategy, Nguyen said Kido will split into four industry groups, namely cooking oil, ice cream, confectionery and fish sauce.

In the near future, the company will enter joint ventures with multinational corporations in each industry, seeking their help in connecting Kido with domestic and foreign markets, he said.

Nguyen emphasized 2023 will be the year of separating the group's member companies into independent entities to easily connect with multinational companies.

In the first nine months of the year, Kido reported a net revenue of VND9,569 billion ($406 million) and after-tax profit of VND487.7 billion ($20.69 million), up 29% and down 24% year-on-year, respectively.

In November, Kido had entirely divested from Calofic Corporation - owner of many cooking oil brands like Neptune, Simply, and Meizan, to restructure its cooking oil segment. Accordingly, Vietnam Vegetable Oils Industry Corporation, a subsidiary of Kido, transferred its entire 24% stake at Calofic to Siteki Investment for nearly VND2,158 billion ($86.99 million).

After the deal, Kido Group only owns a single cooking oil brand with a large market share, TuongAn Vegetable Oil JSC (TAC).