Simultaneously Proposes Compromises to Reach Fair Resolution of
Civil Rehabilitation Process
TOKYO, Dec. 9 /PRNewswire-Asia-FirstCall/ -- Tobias Josef Brown, Managing Director of UCL Asia Ltd. (Hong Kong), who is among the largest shareholders of New City Residence Investment Corporation (TSE: 8965; NCRI) holding about 8.3% of its stock, today made the following announcements.
1. The New City Residence Shareholders' Group has now raised a
committed fund of YEN 75,000,000 to support litigation if the
current civil rehabilitation process results in a settlement that
drastically undervalues the equity holders units in the JREIT. The
litigation fund will be utilized to both file an appeal, if
necessary, with respect to the civil rehabilitation judgment, and,
more importantly, to also to seek compensation from the management
and board of the NCRI JREIT for not properly managing and governing
the operations of the JREIT in such a way as to have protected the
interests of the unit holders. It is very important that all parties
involved in this process not miscalculate with regard to the
seriousness of the New City Residence Shareholders' Group commitment,
and resources available, to protect our interests.
2. The above being said, the New City Residence Shareholders' Group is
keenly aware of the difficult global banking environment and wishes
to let prospective investors and/or new sponsors of the NCRI JREIT
know that it is open to any and all "creative solutions" with regard
recapitalizing or restructuring the JREIT. The New City Residence
Shareholders' Group has entered into promising preliminary
discussions with two bidding parties with regard to their bids and
many of NCRI's institutional shareholders are very open to the idea
of remaining shareholders of a restructured entity and have no need
for immediate liquidity. The New City Residence Shareholders' Group
has no obligation of exclusivity to the two parties mentioned above
and welcomes approaches by any party who may have a proposal to
maximize shareholder value during the restructuring process. To
provide a higher degree of comfort to potential new sponsors, or
investors in NCRI, the Association may be in a position to deliver
binding undertakings from a substantial portion of the institutional
unit holders to participate in a "pre-packaged" cash/shares/or
combination thereof solution which would allow newly injected cash
to focus on addressing concerns of the banks and providing fair
treatment to smaller individual unit holders. We stress the fact
that virtually all of the institutional shareholders on the register
are able to contemplate holding unlisted/illiquid securities. The
New City Residence Shareholders' Group is committed to trying to
play an active and positive role in the restructuring process to
enable an accommodation to be reached that is fair to all
stakeholders.
Profile: Tobias Josef Brown, Managing Director of UCL Asia Ltd. (Hong Kong) has a proven investment track record and had previously worked for 15 years as Chief Investment Officer for the global investment operations of the late Sir James Goldsmith, and was formerly Chairman of the Noble Group (SGX: NOBL), a global supply chain manager of agricultural, metals, minerals and ores, and energy products. As a contrarian investor, Mr. Brown has been involved in major MBO, M&A, and other strategic investments throughout the Asian Pacific region, and is committed to the principles of good corporate governance.
For further information, please contact Edelman Japan K.K.
Thomas R. Zengage
Tel: +81-3-5530-9300 / +81-3-6403-5202
Mobile: +81-90-4533-5007
Email: thomas.zengage@edelman.com
Kensuke Asami
Tel: +81-3-5530-9300 / +81-3-6403-5200
Mobile: +81-90-2168-1686
Email: kensuke.asami@edelman.com
Nanami Soga
Tel: +81-3-5530-9300 / +81-3-6403-5200
Mobile: +81-80-2010-8363
Email: nanami.soga@edelman.com
