The Huon Aquaculture Group Ltd (ASX: HUO) share price is flat on Monday morning. This comes after the salmon producer provided an update on the JBS takeover bid of all Huon shares.
At the time of writing, the Huon share price is trading at its previous closing price of $3.82 apiece. In comparison, the All Ordinaries Index (ASX: XAO) is up 0.2% to 7,737 points.
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What did Huon announce?
Huon chair Neil Kearney advised today that Tattarang Agrifood has indicated it may not support the JBS proposal.
Tattarang Agrifood holds an 18.5% stake in Huon and is owned by West Australian mining magnate Andrew Forrest. Forrest is also the CEO of iron ore giant, Fortescue Metals Group Limited (ASX: FMG).
In a letter to shareholders, Kearney said Forrest has questioned the animal husbandry practices of JBS and the environmental standards of Huon and the Tasmanian salmon industry.
This follows the announcement made on 6 August 2021 that Huon entered into definitive agreements with JBS. The latter offered to acquire 100% of Huon shares for a cash consideration of $3.85 per share.
Based on the last closing price of Huon shares when the strategic review process was announced (26 February 2021), this represents a 61% premium.
In the early phase of the review process, Tattarang expressed interest in Huon and submitted a non-binding and conditional indicative offer for the business. However, that fell through when Tattarang was invited to participate further in the strategic review process.
The directors of Huon stated that the JBS offer of $3.85 per share was materially higher than Tattarang's previous non-binding and conditional indicative offer.
Huon revealed that a booklet outlining the proposal and voting details will be dispatched to shareholders within four weeks.
About the Huon share price
Up until early August when the cash proposal was announced, Huon shares were trading mostly sideways. However, since then the company's share price rocketed almost 50% to sit around the $3.80 mark.
When looking at the last 12-month period, Huon shares have posted a gain of around 40%. In 2021 alone, its shares are up just over 20%.
Huon presides a market capitalisation of roughly $419.7 million, with approximately 109 million shares on its books.
