US Carlyle Group's purchase of Xugong Group halted by China regulator

this is sort of Dubai-like!

BEIJING (AFX) - China's Ministry of Commerce (MoC) has refused to approve US-based private equity firm Carlyle Group's planned purchase of a majority stake in Xugong Group Construction Machinery Co Ltd, the Guangzhou-based Southern Weekly reported.

Citing unidentified sources, the newspaper said that the ministry believed, 'a foreign investor should not hold a controlling stake (in Xugong Group)'.

In October last year, Carlyle Group signed an agreement to pay 375 mln usd for an 85 pct stake in Xugong Group, China's largest construction machinery manufacturer and distributor.

The deal caused strong objections over concerns that foreign investors' had excessive control of the equipment manufacturing sector.

more...

http://www.forbes.com/finance/feeds/afx/2006/03/23/afx2615844.html

For ownership of the largest construction company in the world's fastest growing nation? What gives? Maybe they put a B where they put an M? Are the prices in China really that low?

they make backhoes and cranes, not buildings. Im over here in China and almost all of the heavy lifting equipment is foreign - Caterpillar and Hyundai being the most common. Now, if this was a CONSTRUCTION firm, you better believe the price would be in billions. This place is growing faster than you can possible imagine. :crazy:

In response, the country's top planning agency -- the National Development and Reform Commission -- conducted a survey in the sector concluding that mergers and acquisitions had resulted in monopolization and a loss of home-grown innovation, according to the report.

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...the the U.S. blocked last year.

Pay-back's a bitch. :evilgrin:

who owns it.

Ruthless, maybe, desperate, at times, but not stupid, unlike some country I live in. Except for their AIDS handling, and their sexuality hangups in general, but that's a practically universal human failing.

Nope, stupidity on the modern scale is truly an American invention, based on our long history of gullibity: after all, in America, there's one born every minute!

Remember the free market and how it was going to lift all boats? (Last I heard the CEO preznit was still blabbing about "an ownership society." Anyone else notice the trend in Carlyle and Blackstone and other private equity groups PRIVATIZING the assets of the free market. Anyone else think this is a trend? The public market will be left with the Google's and other puff stories while the hard assets go private. We beleeves in the market; that's why we're taking it private.