Vivendi plans to distribute 60% of UMG capital to shareholders, list it by year-end
PARIS (Reuters) - Vivendi said on Saturday it planned to distribute 60% of Universal Music’s capital to investors, subject to shareholder approval, and aimed to list its most-prized asset, home to singers such as Lady Gaga and Taylor Swift, by the end of the year. The plan to list Universal represents part of a process launched by Vivendi’s top shareholder French billionaire Vincent Bollore to cash in on the music industry’s revival. “Vivendi’s leading institutional shareholders have been pressing for a number of years for a split or the distribution of Universal Music Group (UMG) to reduce Vivendi’s conglomerate discount,” Vivendi said in a statement. The French conglomerate said the distribution would take the form of a special dividend. UMG, a holding company currently being incorporated in the Netherlands, will apply for a listing on Euronext in Amsterdam. The transaction has received a favorable response from the consortium led by China’s tech group Tencent, which now contro...