Tobacco.org

Japan Tobacco Says State Will Sell Stake ‘Eventually’ (Update1)  

Japan Tobacco Inc. said the country’s government will “eventually” sell its stake in the maker of Benson & Hedges cigarettes as Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama may want to raise funds to stem rising public debt.

“What we hear is that they think about privatization, which includes us,” Munetaka Takeda, executive deputy president, told a briefing in London yesterday. “So, eventually it’s likely to happen.”

Japan’s government owns 50.01 percent of the cigarette maker, having sold stock three times since the company was founded in 1985. Shares of Japan Tobacco, the world’s third- largest publicly traded cigarette maker, have fallen 14 percent since Hatoyama came to office on Sept. 16, as the government debates whether to raise taxes on cigarettes.

“In the future, privatization has to be done,” said Yasuhiro Matsumoto, a senior analyst at Shinsei Securities Co. in Tokyo. Still, “the government wants to keep some control over Japan Tobacco to raise taxes.”

Jump to full article »