Nissan may consider buying its own stock if Renault sells part of its stake in the Japanese car manufacturer. AFP
Nissan may consider buying its own stock if Renault sells part of its stake in the Japanese car manufacturer. AFP
Nissan may consider buying its own stock if Renault sells part of its stake in the Japanese car manufacturer. AFP
Nissan may consider buying its own stock if Renault sells part of its stake in the Japanese car manufacturer. AFP

Nissan shares slide on reports Renault may sell down its stake in Japanese car maker


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Nissan Motor's shares fell the most in six weeks on news that Renault is considering selling part of its stake in the Japanese car maker.

Nissan’s stock declined as much as 4.8 per cent in early trading in Tokyo on Monday, the biggest intraday drop since March 11. Renault shares fell 1.3 per cent in Paris on Friday after Bloomberg reported the potential change in shareholding.

The move could raise billions of euros for Renault’s shift to electric vehicles and ease long-standing tensions with its alliance partner, sources said.

Nissan itself may be willing to buy some of the 1.83 billion shares in the Japanese car maker that Renault owns, sources said. Renault may also seek other acquirers for a portion of its 43 per cent stake in Nissan, the sources said.

Representatives for Renault and Nissan declined to comment.

By paring a stake worth 983.5 billion yen ($7.64bn), Renault would be walking a fine line: trying to rebalance a 23-year-old alliance without unravelling it. A lopsided cross-shareholding structure — Nissan owns just 15 per cent of Renault and lacks voting rights — has been a pain point for factions of Nissan executives going back years.

A sale could help finance major structural change Renault chief executive Luca de Meo began to sketch out in February. The company is considering a break-up and separate listing of its EV business. Its legacy business could then join forces with a partner.

One option would be China’s Zhejiang Geely Holding Group, which controls Volvo Car, the sources said. Renault reached a joint production deal with Geely earlier this year for a South Korean plant, and the two have said they may also co-operate in China.

A representative for Geely declined to comment.

Mr De Meo, 54, was making strides turning Renault around before Russia’s military action in Ukraine all but forced the company to begin exiting its second-largest market. The pullout will be costly: the car maker said it will take a non-cash charge amounting to the €2.2bn ($2.4bn) value of its assets in Russia, which include a manufacturing plant in Moscow. It’s also assessing options for its stake in Lada maker AvtoVaz and may try to transfer ownership to a local investor.

Negotiations to reshape the Renault-Nissan alliance — which haven’t been discussed publicly — could take many months, the sources said.

Renault’s EV carve-out could include Nissan assets. Nissan also would be a partner in the French car maker’s legacy hybrid and combustion-engine operations, they said.

The two companies are working with one another on Renault’s structural overhaul, chief financial officer Thierry Pieton told analysts on Friday.

“Nissan is in the loop,” Mr Pieton said. “This is obviously something that we want to discuss with them.”

A Renault Megane E-tech electric vehicle. The company is considering a break-up and separate listing of its EV business. Bloomberg
A Renault Megane E-tech electric vehicle. The company is considering a break-up and separate listing of its EV business. Bloomberg

Nissan would be in a better position than a year ago to buy back its shares, should Renault decide to sell. The Yokohama, Japan-based company has 2 trillion yen in cash and equivalents on hand, and fiscal year operating profit is on track to be positive for the first time since 2019.

Ashwani Gupta, Nissan’s chief operating officer, will travel to Paris next week for discussions with Renault’s Mr de Meo before a broader meeting between Renault and Nissan’s executives in Tokyo next month.

Tension surrounding the asymmetrical nature of the companies’ ties almost destroyed the alliance following the 2018 arrest in Japan of former chairman Carlos Ghosn. The car makers have since been focused on separate turnaround plans to get them past damage wrought by Mr Ghosn’s ouster and the pandemic.

Negotiations aimed at rebalancing the Franco-Japanese alliance, which also includes Mitsubishi Motors, were held in 2019 but took a back seat to more urgent operational and management issues. They have been kept off the table until now.

Reducing Renault’s stake to 15 per cent, the same level as Nissan’s ownership of Renault, could yield about €4.65bn at current prices. It’s unlikely the Paris suburb-based car maker would sell the entire holding, as that would weaken the alliance.

The operating agreement governing the partnership, known as Rama, may also have to be amended with a change in shareholding, some of the sources said. The accord has long been a source of friction between the partners, as has the French state’s 15 per cent holding in Renault, which comes with double voting rights.

Coming soon

Torno Subito by Massimo Bottura

When the W Dubai – The Palm hotel opens at the end of this year, one of the highlights will be Massimo Bottura’s new restaurant, Torno Subito, which promises “to take guests on a journey back to 1960s Italy”. It is the three Michelinstarred chef’s first venture in Dubai and should be every bit as ambitious as you would expect from the man whose restaurant in Italy, Osteria Francescana, was crowned number one in this year’s list of the World’s 50 Best Restaurants.

Akira Back Dubai

Another exciting opening at the W Dubai – The Palm hotel is South Korean chef Akira Back’s new restaurant, which will continue to showcase some of the finest Asian food in the world. Back, whose Seoul restaurant, Dosa, won a Michelin star last year, describes his menu as,  “an innovative Japanese cuisine prepared with a Korean accent”.

Dinner by Heston Blumenthal

The highly experimental chef, whose dishes are as much about spectacle as taste, opens his first restaurant in Dubai next year. Housed at The Royal Atlantis Resort & Residences, Dinner by Heston Blumenthal will feature contemporary twists on recipes that date back to the 1300s, including goats’ milk cheesecake. Always remember with a Blumenthal dish: nothing is quite as it seems. 

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The Travel Diaries of Albert Einstein The Far East, Palestine, and Spain, 1922 – 1923
Editor Ze’ev Rosenkranz
​​​​​​​Princeton

RESULTS

West Asia Premiership

Thursday
Jebel Ali Dragons 13-34 Dubai Exiles

Friday
Dubai Knights Eagles 16-27 Dubai Tigers

Movie: Saheb, Biwi aur Gangster 3

Producer: JAR Films

Director: Tigmanshu Dhulia

Cast: Sanjay Dutt, Jimmy Sheirgill, Mahie Gill, Chitrangda Singh, Kabir Bedi

Rating: 3 star

Who is Tim-Berners Lee?

Sir Tim Berners-Lee was born in London in a household of mathematicians and computer scientists. Both his mother, Mary Lee, and father, Conway, were early computer scientists who worked on the Ferranti 1 - the world's first commercially-available, general purpose digital computer. Sir Tim studied Physics at the University of Oxford and held a series of roles developing code and building software before moving to Switzerland to work for Cern, the European Particle Physics laboratory. He developed the worldwide web code as a side project in 1989 as a global information-sharing system. After releasing the first web code in 1991, Cern made it open and free for all to use. Sir Tim now campaigns for initiatives to make sure the web remains open and accessible to all.

Red flags
  • Promises of high, fixed or 'guaranteed' returns.
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  • Lack of clear information, vague language, no access to audited financials.
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Courtesy: Carol Glynn, founder of Conscious Finance Coaching

MATCH INFO

Manchester City 3
Danilo (16'), Bernardo Silva (34'), Fernandinho (72')

Brighton & Hove Albion 1
Ulloa (20')

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UAE tour of Zimbabwe

All matches in Bulawayo
Friday, Sept 26 – UAE won by 36 runs
Sunday, Sept 28 – Second ODI
Tuesday, Sept 30 – Third ODI
Thursday, Oct 2 – Fourth ODI
Sunday, Oct 5 – First T20I
Monday, Oct 6 – Second T20I

2025 Fifa Club World Cup groups

Group A: Palmeiras, Porto, Al Ahly, Inter Miami.

Group B: Paris Saint-Germain, Atletico Madrid, Botafogo, Seattle.

Group C: Bayern Munich, Auckland City, Boca Juniors, Benfica.

Group D: Flamengo, ES Tunis, Chelsea, Leon.

Group E: River Plate, Urawa, Monterrey, Inter Milan.

Group F: Fluminense, Borussia Dortmund, Ulsan, Mamelodi Sundowns.

Group G: Manchester City, Wydad, Al Ain, Juventus.

Group H: Real Madrid, Al Hilal, Pachuca, Salzburg.

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The smuggler

Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple. 
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.

Khouli conviction

Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.

For sale

A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.

- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico

- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000

- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950

What can you do?

Document everything immediately; including dates, times, locations and witnesses

Seek professional advice from a legal expert

You can report an incident to HR or an immediate supervisor

You can use the Ministry of Human Resources and Emiratisation’s dedicated hotline

In criminal cases, you can contact the police for additional support

UEFA CHAMPIONS LEAGUE FIXTURES

All kick-off times 10.45pm UAE ( 4 GMT) unless stated

Tuesday
Sevilla v Maribor
Spartak Moscow v Liverpool
Manchester City v Shakhtar Donetsk
Napoli v Feyenoord
Besiktas v RB Leipzig
Monaco v Porto
Apoel Nicosia v Tottenham Hotspur
Borussia Dortmund v Real Madrid

Wednesday
Basel v Benfica
CSKA Moscow Manchester United
Paris Saint-Germain v Bayern Munich
Anderlecht v Celtic
Qarabag v Roma (8pm)
Atletico Madrid v Chelsea
Juventus v Olympiakos
Sporting Lisbon v Barcelona

Updated: April 25, 2022, 10:16 AM`