American International Group Inc (NYSE:AIG) continues to persuade the Chinese investment consortium to sell its aircraft leasing business even as the deadline for the deal expired on July 31, people familiar with the matter told Zachary Tracer of Bloomberg. Recently, Chinese news agency Caixin reported that the potential Chinese buyers withdrew their bid.
AIG expects to seal the deal by the end of August
Both American International Group Inc (NYSE:AIG) and the Chinese consortium had the option to terminate the contract. The Chinese investors have missed three deadlines so far. A June 14 deadline was moved to a later date, which was further revised to July 31. The American insurance giant said that it hasn’t received the payments of $4.8 billion to close the deal, the company said during its quarterly earnings conference call.
The two parties now expect to close the deal in by the end of August, sources told Reuters. American International Group Inc (NYSE:AIG) said it will keep all options open. If the deal with Chinese buyers doesn’t go through, the insurer can look for a new buyer for International Lease Finance Corp (ILFC) or spin off the business in an IPO.
Chinese consortium yet to pay 90% of agreed sum
The Chinese consortium includes New China Trust Co, P3 Investments and China Aviation Industrial Fund. They agreed to buy ILFC for $4.8 billion last year. According to their December 2012 agreement with American International Group Inc (NYSE:AIG), they would buy an 80.1% stake in the plane-leasing unit with an option to buy another 9.9% stake. American International Group Inc (NYSE:AIG) will retain the remaining 10% stake. Though the Chinese investors have paid a 10% deposit, they are yet to pay the remaining sum.
ILFC is one of the world’s largest airplane lessors, but has been struggling over the past few years. American International Group Inc (NYSE:AIG) once estimated the business to be worth about $10 billion, but its value has diminished over the past few years amid large write-downs. AIG is offloading is non-core assets to focus on its core business.
American International Group Inc (NYSE:AIG) shares were down 0.16% to $48.49 at 10:23 AM EDT.
