Ing C Olivetti & Co SpA’s purchase of 51% of Scanvest Ring AS of Norway in April for $71m has turned horribly sour for the Italian, which is now under pressure from the Oslo Stock Exchange to offer the same NKr68.50 a share to the minority holders of 49% of the company as it paid for its controlling stake. That would be a bitter pill for Olivetti to swallow, because since the acquisition, performance at the company has gone sharply into reverse, and the shares were down at NKr18 when trading was suspended last week. According to the Wall Street Journal, if Olivetti refuses to oblige, Scanvest could be the first company to be expelled from the Oslo Stock Exchange. The shares have plummeted because once Olivetti took control, it found unexpected financial problems at Scanvest’s Swedish and US operations that cost write-offs of $12.3m to put right, leading to a loss for the first nine months of $14.8m against a profit for the same period last year of $5.8m. The discrepancies in the accounts led Olivetti to say that it wants to renegotiate the purchase price, and Scanvest’s chairman Sjur Svaboe, architect of the sale of the majority stake to Olivetti, now says he will be resigning on January 1.
