Wednesday, Feb 08, 2012
FRANKFURT (Dow Jones)--Daimler AG's (DAI.XE) main shareholder, Abu Dhabi's sovereign-wealth fund Aabar Investments PJS, has secured access to a further 7.85% of shares in the German car maker through call options, news agency dapd reports Thursday.
The news agency cites a voting rights announcement which says Aabar holds cash-settled call options of 7.85% of Daimler's shares.
Aabar, which already holds a roughly 9% stake in the car maker, wasn't immediately available for comment.
Dapd quotes a Daimler spokesman as saying the voting rights announcement was triggered by a change in the German Securities Trading Act.
According to the article, the change in the law, called the Wertpapierhandelsgesetz, means from Feb. 1 financial instruments such as share options have to be publicly disclosed after a certain point, impeding so-called creeping takeovers, by which companies use cash-settled options to secretly secure large stakes in companies, as happened with Continental AG (CON.XE) and Volkswagen AG (VOW.XE).
The Daimler share has risen about 50% in value since mid-December, the article reports.
News agency website: www.dapd.de/
-Frankfurt Bureau, Dow Jones Newswires; 49-69-29725-500.
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
08-02-12 1751GMT
