By Adam Whittaker
Prosus said its finance chief will retire later this year, continuing a management reshuffle as the tech investor seeks to close a gap between its market value and that of its stake in Chinese technology giant Tencent Holdings.
News of the retirement of Basil Sgourdos, finance chief at both Amsterdam-listed Prosus and its South African parent Naspers, came after the companies in May named Fabricio Bloisi as their new chief executive. Long-time CEO Bob van Dijk stepped down in September last year and was replaced in the interim by Ervin Tu, the companies' chief investment officer.
Sgourdos will also step down as finance chief of parent company Naspers when he retires on Nov. 30. No timeline for the appointment of a successor was provided.
The move triggers a search for a new finance head who will inherit the task of narrowing the discount between Prosus' share price and the value of its investments.
Prosus shares traded slightly higher in European morning trade Thursday, giving the company a market capitalization of 77.3 billion euros ($84.43 billion), according to its website. Its stake in Tencent alone was valued at $105.8 billion as of Wednesday's close and Prosus owns shareholdings in a number of other companies including food-delivery groups DoorDash, Delivery Hero, Meituan and iFood, whose net asset value totaled $136.9 billion, according to the company's website.
Naspers spun out its international tech investments to form Prosus and listed the company in Amsterdam in 2019 in an attempt to reduce the valuation gap. Sgourdos was chief financial officer of Prosus since its listing, and group chief financial director of Naspers since 2014.
More recently, Prosus and Naspers have been buying back their own stock through an open-ended program that they fund through small sales of Tencent stock. Prosus had $14.6 billion of cash on hand at the end of March, according to its annual report.
"We remain committed to reducing the discount and better reflecting our portfolio's value in our share price," Sgourdos said in an earnings call in June.
Sgourdos's retirement got a mixed response from analysts. Citi analysts said the move increases uncertainty given the recent CEO change, but analysts at Jefferies pointed out that a complete refresh of the leadership team could be positive in the long run.
Write to Adam Whittaker at adam.whittaker@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
August 08, 2024 04:37 ET (08:37 GMT)
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