SINGAPORE (Jan 14): Chou Cheng Ngok, the controlling shareholder and CEO of Popular Holdings, is planning to take the textbook publisher and property developer private.

Grand Apex Holdings, a special purpose vehicle belonging to Chou and his wife Hu Nan Lee, is offering 32 cents for all the shares they do not own.

The offer price has a 39.1% premium over the last traded price of 23 cents on Jan 13 and values Popular at about $255 million, based on the 797 million shares issued.

According to its website, Popular has an NAV of 27.4 cents per share for the FY14 ended April.

Currently, Chou and Hu collectively hold a 61.25% stake or 488.2 million shares in Popular.

“The intention of the Offeror, and the purpose of the Offer, is to delist and privatise the Company,” said CIMB Bank, which is representing Grand Apex, in the offer document.

According to the announcement, the privatisation of Popular will allow the company to avoid compliance costs associated with the extended time it was taking to sell unsold units at Ei8ht Raja, a residential property developed by Popular.

Shareholders will have the opportunity to realise their investments in the company for a cash consideration at an attractive premium over the historical transacted prices, without incurring any brokerage and other trading costs, CIMB added.

To be sure, the trading volume of the Popular shares has been generally low, with an average daily trading volume of 307,901 shares during the 12-month period up to today.

This represents only 0.10% of the shares held in public hands as at July 8.