(Bloomberg) -- WH Group Ltd.’s plan to sell 20% of Smithfield Foods Inc. through a New York share offering is expected to value the maker of Farmland bacon and Farmer John sausages at $5.38 billion or more, according to the Chinese company.
The spinoff and share offering of Smithfield would boost the Virginia-based pork producer’s access to capital markets, unlock value and give it more flexibility to make deals, WH said in a Hong Kong stock exchange filing. The deal is still pending approval by shareholders and US regulators.
The push for a Smithfield listing comes more than a decade after WH Group acquired the business for $4.7 billion — then the largest Chinese takeover of a US company — and made it private, raising food security concerns among US lawmakers. Pork consumption growth has since significantly slowed down in the Asian nation.
Smithfield has over the past few years streamlined its operations, including through the shutdown of its processing operations in California, as part of efforts to restore profits after a major industry downturn. It has also boosted investments in automation to cope with labor shortages.
Most pork produced by Smithfield in the US and Mexico is for domestic consumption, with exports including to China making up for a smaller share of revenue, according to WH.
While Smithfield’s final price is yet to be set, WH Group said it expects to receive “no less” than its unaudited net asset value of about $5.38 billion, or roughly 9.9 times earnings. On Thursday, US rivals Tyson Foods Inc. and Hormel Foods Corp. traded at roughly 18 times expected earnings, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
“A higher valuation can reasonably be expected” in the US offering, based on the comparison with other US meat companies, WH Group said.
A draft registration statement for the Smithfield share sale was submitted on Oct. 4.
WH, which is the world’s largest pork supplier, first announced the proposed share sale in July. Bloomberg News reported at the time it planned to raise at least $1 billion from the listing. Smithfield expects to use the money on capital investments in infrastructure, automation, and expanding packaged meats capacity, according to the filing dated Nov. 18.
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