In 2008 the stock prices of Finnish companies listed on the OMX Nordic Exchange Helsinki Oy have dropped considerably. This decline, combined with a fairly new takeover regime with more liberal rules on the pricing of tender offers, brings new opportunities to potential bidders for Finnish listed companies.
For a number of years it has been unattractive to launch a public tender offer for a Finnish listed company in declining stock markets. This has been due to provisions effectively setting a minimum offer price equal to the previous 12-month volume-weighted average price of the shares when launching a public tender offer for all shares of a Finnish target.
The provisions of the Finnish Securities Markets Act (the SMA) regulating public takeovers were amended in 2006 in connection with the implementation of the Takeover Directive. The previous provisions leading to a minimum tender offer price were abolished.
Consequently, for the first...