Divesting of SSIC’s Divestible Shares through Negotiations

Following the launch of M&A Platform on IFB’s Third Market a few months ago, Iran Fara Bourse CEO and managing director of Social Security Investment Company (SSIC) sat together yesterday at a press conference to elaborate on the very platform and the divestiture process.

The Social Security Investment Company also known by its Persian acronym Shasta was established in 1986 for the purpose of investment, contribution, and attainment of interests and benefits from the reserves of Social Security Organization.

Divestment process acceleration and facilitation and transparency improvement of the transactions are the principal goals for divesting the divestible shares of SSIC’s subordinates through negotiations.

Amir Hamooni, the IFB CEO, said tax exemption, efficient price discovery and transparency in divesting of divestible shares are of most important privileges of the M&A platform establishment.

According to Hamooni, the corresponding information on 38 firms (SSIC’s subordinates) slated for divestiture is on this platform (https://www.ifb.ir/ThirdMarket/OfferableThirdMarketMenu.aspx). Moreover, divesting through M&A platform does not require red tape, i.e. getting information of firms is upon request and as block trades is the only way one can buy these shares it would be reasonable to pay for professional advice to scrutinize the financial statements, he added.

Making SSIC more competitive

The managing director of Social Security Investment Company said that divesting of divestible shares of SSIC’s Subordinates will get done through IFB M&A platform because of the transparency which brings people to trust the process.

“We are here to support fair competition with the private sector,” said managing director of Shasta, Morteza Lotfi, during this meeting. He then mentioned that the number of SSIC’s holdings decrease from 9 to 5 resulted in reducing costs and increasing efficiency.

The investment arm of Social Security Organization controls nine holdings operating in a wide range of sectors, including petroleum, petrochemicals, pharmaceuticals, cement, transportation, and finance.