Public Company - Privatization

Privatization

A group of private investors or another company that is privately held can buy out the shareholders of a public company, taking the company private. This is typically done through a leveraged buyout and occurs when the buyers believe the securities have been undervalued by investors.

In addition, one publicly traded company may be purchased by one or more publicly traded company(ies), with the bought-out company either becoming a subsidiary or joint venture of the purchaser(s) or ceasing to exist as a separate entity, its former shareholders receiving either cash, shares in the purchasing company or a combination of both. When the compensation in question is primarily shares then the deal is often considered a merger. Subsidiaries and joint ventures can also be created de novo - this often happens in the financial sector. Subsidiaries and joint ventures of publicly traded companies are not generally considered to be privately held companies (even though they themselves are not publicly traded) and are generally subject to the same reporting requirements as publicly traded companies. Finally, shares in subsidiaries and joint ventures can be (re)-offered to the public at any time - firms that are sold in this manner are called spin-outs.

Most industrialized jurisdictions have enacted laws and regulations that detail the steps that prospective owners (public or private) must undertake if they wish to take over a publicly traded corporation. This often entails the would-be buyer(s) making a formal offer for each share of the company to shareholders. Normally some form of supermajority is required for this sort of the offer to be approved, but once it happens then usually all shareholders are compelled to sell at the agreed-upon price and the company either becomes a subsidiary, ceases to exist or becomes privately held.