经济类文章精选：ONE STEP FORWARD, ONE STEP BACK
11 ONE STEP FORWARD, ONE STEP BACK
At last, GM bags Daewoo Motor. But Hynix eludes capture
THE government is desperate to sell the most troubled of South Korea's big companies to foreigners. This, ministers believe, is the best way to accelerate the corporate restructuring begun in the wake of the Asian financial crisis in 1997, and to clear the way for more sustainable economic growth. This week, after months of on-off talks with foreign suitors, the government's plans moved a big step forward, and then an equally big step back.
On April 30th General Motors (GM) signed a contract to buy the bankrupt Daewoo Motor. But on the same day, the board of Hynix, a cash-strapped memory-chip giant, shocked the markets by rejecting a proposed takeover by Micron Technology, an American competitor. Micron had offered to pay about $3.4 billion for Hynix's core memory business, and to take a minority stake in the non-memory arm. Analysts predict that the government will put pressure on creditors to rescue a deal with Micron or seek a new buyer, as liquidation is too risky to contemplate in an election year.
GM's deal with Daewoo Motor marks the end of an even longer and more painful process. Ford almost bought the car maker two years ago, but pulled out after deciding that Daewoo would be too hard to turn round. GM had been talking with Daewoo for over a year. It has agreed to buy two of the company's four domestic car plants, a factory in Vietnam, a parts unit in the Netherlands and nine overseassales arms (all in Europe except one, in Puerto Rico of all places). Between them, the two domestic factories can churn out a combined 530,000 cars and 30,000 commercial vehicles a year.
GM has struck a good deal. Together with various undisclosed partners, it will hold a 67% stake in a new company, tentatively named GM-Daewoo. The American car maker will pay $251m for its own stake of 42%, but it will also assume $5