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- in 2009, Robert Kuok announced he was exiting the sugar business in Malaysia and many Chinese Malaysians believed (and still believe) that Robert Kuok was forced to sell due to govt pressure or due to racist or crony reasons and that Robert Kuok is now pissed-off at Malaysia and will never invest back here again
- This is not true as the shrewd Robert Kuok sold the sugar business for purely commercial reasons.
- Kuok's PPB sold its sugar business for RM1.25billion to Felda and received a good price for it.
- The first and most important reason is that Sugar price in Malaysia is a price-controlled item and the world-wide price of sugar was rising tremendously during in 2008-2009 due to sugar cane crop failures in Brazil and India and also because much of the sugar was being diverted to make ethanol (due to high world oil prices). Since the cost of raw materials and production would then be higher than the controlled price of Sugar in Malaysia (which was the second-cheapest in the world), this would be bad business for Robert Kuok.
- The second reason is that Robert Kuok had a better deal and within months of selling the Sugar business in Malaysia for RM1.2billion, he went to buy the much larger sugar business in Australia (and the 5th largest in the world) for RM5 billion (US$1.5). Sugar price in Australia is not price-controlled. Nobody goes to buy a multi-billion business without years of planning and study!
- And as for Robert Kuok no longer interested in Malaysia because he is pissed-off... in April (just 2 weeks before GE13), The Kuok group invested Rm200million and has teamed up with Khazanah to develop a RM1billion project in Iskandar Johor.
- and just two weeks ago, Robert Kuok donated RM100million to the Universiti of Xiamen in Malaysia.
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Kuok’s vehicle, PPB Group Bhd, is getting RM1.25bil from the sale of its sugar refineries and land used for sugar cane cultivation to Felda. Of this, the largest asset is the Malayan Sugar Manufacturing (MSM) operations, that was sold for RM1.2bil.
PPB Group said its cost of investment in MSM was RM60mil (incurred from 1976 to 1999), thereby giving it a massive gain of RM1.17bil from the sale.
Furthermore, the price of RM1.2bil represents a price-earnings multiple of 9.8 times MSM’s FY2008 earnings and a price-to-book ratio of 2.46 times. On both counts, the deal seems to have been reasonably priced.
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Kuok invests in Iskandar: http://www.theedgemalaysia.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=236721&Itemid=79
Why Robert Kuok exited the Sugar Business
http://www.theedgemalaysia.com/features/153785-cover-story-the-reason-for-kuoks-exit.html
One of many zombie-creating spins about Robert Kuok to make Chinese angry at govt: http://1426.blogspot.com/2012/07/dont-mess-with-robert-kuok.html
