Possible merger of Cosco Group-China Shipping Group may not bring much joy

Investors who have been locked in suspended mainland shipping stocks should think twice about the potential merits of a merger.

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Possible merger of Cosco Group-China Shipping Group may not bring much joy

JING YANG
01 September 2015

Investors who have been locked in suspended mainland shipping stocks should think twice about the potential merits of a merger.

It is very easy to jump to the conclusion a marriage between Cosco Group and China Shipping Group, the country’s two largest shipping conglomerates, will be a gleeful re-run of the train makers’ unification which earned shareholders a great deal.

Cosco and China Shipping have five listed subsidiaries in Hong Kong and six in Shanghai, Shenzhen and Singapore – a situation that makes it more complex than the China CNR-China CSR merger. The 11 stocks entered a trading suspension en masse from August 11. Three of them are considered flagships, namely China Cosco Holdings, China Shipping Container Lines (CSCL) and China Shipping Development, all of which are A+H dual-listed.

In the recent earnings season, all three reported disappointing results compared to their Hong Kong and foreign peers. What is even more disappointing, perhaps, is none of the companies uttered a peep on the ongoing “material event”, regulatory shorthand for a merger.

“Not a word in these reports about any potential restructuring,” writes Jefferies analyst Johnson Leung. “It is difficult to highlight much material impact from the merger except maybe a monopoly coastal container liner if there is a merger between Cosco and CSCL.”

Interestingly, investors are less enthusiastic in these “real consolidation stories” than they were in the “faked consolidation stories”, or the operational alliances of P3 – which was scuppered by mainland Chinese authorities – and G6, a bloc of six container shipping lines, Leung added.

This may be due to the industry’s dire fundamentals and outlook. Before China’s economic slowdown was widely felt, shipping had already been crippled by a harrowing glut. The state carriers, on the other hand, have not been the smartest players in a cyclical and capital-intensive industry, as shown in their financial records.

“We believe concerns in the market about a global and China [macroeconomic] slowdown will outweigh any positive sentiment on the stock from the potential merger,” wrote Kelvin Lau at Daiwa Capital Markets.

Echoing Leung’s point, Lau added: “As both companies are small, and will stay small even if they merge, we do not expect the new merged entity to have better bargaining power within the industry.”

Lau cut the 12-month target price for CSCL to HK$2.30 from HK$2.90, due to adverse market conditions. CSCL closed at HK$3.11 on August 7, the last trading day before the halt.

Barclays analyst Esme Pao, in contrast, is slightly more upbeat. “We believe that consolidation would benefit profitability and the share prices of potential merger companies,” she wrote.

Still, none of the state shipping lines are favourites of Pao. Her top pick in the Asia excluding Japan transport and infrastructure sector is Orient Overseas (International) Limited, the holding company of Orient Overseas Container Line, run by the family of former Hong Kong chief executive Tung Chee-hwa.

“We believe the company will generate better-than-peers returns given its best-in-class operations,” Pao wrote in a 45-page report on the stock she believes is underappreciated.

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