Source: Wall Street News
Due to profit data and repurchase plans for the third fiscal quarter that exceeded expectations,$Mitsubishi (8058.JP)$The stock price rose 9.74% on Wednesday, the biggest increase since August 2020.
On Tuesday, February 6, Mitsubishi Corporation said that in the third fiscal quarter of last year (October to December 2023), the company's net profit nearly tripled year-on-year. At the same time, it announced that it will spend 500 billion yen (approximately US$3.37 billion) to repurchase up to 10% of the shares. This is Mitsubishi Corporation's largest repurchase plan since 2016.
Mitsubishi Corp. said in a statement that the buyback will take place between February 7 and September 30, and plans to cancel all shares repurchased on October 31. Through the buyback plan, Mitsubishi Corporation will effectively raise the company's stock price and increase shareholder returns.
In addition, Mitsubishi Corporation also said it has reached an agreement with Japan Telecom KDDI to privatize the convenience store chain operator Lawson in order to accelerate the pace of business digitalization. KDDI currently holds about 2.1% of Lawson's shares. The company said on the 6th that it will propose to buy 50% of Lawson's shares at a price of 10,360 yen per share, with a total value of nearly 496.5 billion yen (about 3.3 billion US dollars). Mitsubishi Corporation will retain 50% of its current shares in Lawson.
The sharp rise in Mitsubishi Corporation's stock price is good news for investors including Buffett. As early as 2022, Buffett established the five largest trading companies in Japan: ITOCHU Corporation, Marubeni Corporation, Mitsubishi Corporation, Mitsui & Co., and Sumitomo Corporation.
On August 31, 2022, Berkshire Hathaway announced that it had obtained 5% of the shares issued by the five largest trading companies in Japan through subsidiaries. Berkshire also said that the possibility of increasing its shareholding to 9.9% is not ruled out.
Up to now, Berkshire's shares in these five companies have ranged from 7.5% to 8.4%.
Editor/jayden