Tsingtao investment was a home run for Anheuser-Busch
Anheuser-Busch InBev’s decision to sell most of its stake in China’s Tsingtao made sense for a couple of reasons. First, the big brewer needs to sell assets to pay down debt. Second, the Chinese government had prohibited A-B InBev from increasing its stake in Tsingtao.
What surprised me was just how lucrative this investment has been. Anheuser-Busch invested $182 million in October 2002 for a 22.4 percent stake in Tsingtao, adding to the 4.5 percent that it bought in 1993 for a mere $16 million. The share sale announced today is for $664 million, and A-B InBev still owns 7 percent of the Chinese brewer. By my quick back-of-the-envelope calculation, the investment that A-B made in 2002 has at least quadrupled in value in a little more than 7 years.
A look at Tsingtao’s shares, traded in Hong Kong, confirms this. From our archives, I can’t tell whether the 2002 transaction was based on a market price, but the Hong Kong shares have risen by 290 percent since then. A-B InBev will do even better than that, as the company’s news release makes clear: Japanese brewer Asahi is paying a 38 percent premium over the market price.
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David Nicklaus has covered St. Louis business for more than 25 years. His column appears three days a week on the Post-Dispatch business page. 
Sad they can’t pay their bills on time. 120 days is criminal, shame on you AB Inbev. You should be embarassed.
Inbev’s acquisition of A-B made sense from a strategic standpoint but certainly not from a monetary standpoint.
Hmmmmm, AB-InvBev is nothing more than the Walmart of the beer industry, trying to throw their weight around. If I were a company who had to depend upon on-time payments, I would not do business with them and I don’t blame of those vendors if they don’t. What works overseas doesn’t necessarily mean it will work here.
It’s amazing what hindsight does to a story. I distinctly remember multiple articles concerning AB buying a share of Tsingtao in national publications that seriously questioned the deal…I wonder what deals those same schmucks are criticizing today?
China is prudent enough to limit foreign investors from taking control of Chinese companies. Is too late for America to learn that lesson to protect America from foreign investors. When are we going to protect America from losing its influence? Americans did it for many years and maintained being the strongest country in the world with a dollar that had strength. Look where we are today. When are we going to step up for America not just the corporate world to make a buck and not care about America!