EDF shareholders are asking the AMF (Autorité des marchés financiers) to “suspend” its decision expected on Tuesday concerning the renationalization of EDF, because they feel they have been harmed by the terms of the takeover bid led by the State, according to a letter of which AFP obtained a copy on Monday.
They indicate that they have summoned EDF before the Commercial Court of Paris, a summary hearing scheduled to take place on Monday afternoon and which could put obstacles in the way of the procedure.
These shareholders, mostly employees and former employees, gathered under the banner of the Fonds Commun de Placement d’Entreprise (FCPE) Actions EDF, which is associated with the shareholders’ association Energie en actions, are contesting the conditions under which the Board of Directors of the electricity company has validated the said takeover bid. Together they represent about 1.5% of the capital, according to an Energies en actions official.
They consider in particular “that the Board of Directors was not validly convened, insofar as the statutory time limit of seven days for convening the meeting, provided for by EDF’s internal regulations, was not respected”.
Another grievance is that “all the documents that should allow the directors to decide on the project”. (…) “were not sent to the directors within a reasonable timeframe, since they were received on October 26 between 8:00 p.m. and 11:02 p.m., i.e., less than 12 hours, and during the night preceding the EDF board meeting,” according to the letter.
The directors had to acquaint themselves with “more than 500 pages and documents relating to particularly technical financial and legal analyses”, according to the shareholders who denounce “a serious breach of the duty to inform”.
As for the summary proceedings before the commercial court, “insofar as the outcome of this hearing (on Monday) will have direct consequences on the follow-up to the Offer, and on the validity of the elements filed with the AMF (by EDF), we ask you to suspend the investigation of the Offer by your services while awaiting the decision” of the commercial court, they conclude in their letter to the AMF.
Unless an appeal is lodged, the AMF’s decision is expected on Tuesday, for an opening of the offer on Thursday and a closing on December 8.
The State shareholder (which already has 84% of the capital) hopes to obtain, at the closing of the takeover bid, 90%, the threshold above which a compulsory withdrawal procedure from the Stock Exchange can be launched to recover shares.
On October 4, the French government officially launched the process of renationalizing EDF, a 9.7 billion euro operation sought by the government to relaunch a vast nuclear program after a black year for the electricity group.
