Pesquera Camanchaca’s decision to list its salmon business, Salmones Camanchaca, in Oslo has prompted the parent company’s managing director, Ricardo Garcia, to make a few noteworthy remarks on the industry to newspaper El Mercurio.
“(The industry) is like a 15-year-old boy,” Garcia.
“He’s maturing and convincing his peers in society that he’s behaving well and that its worthwhile to believe in,” he was quoted as saying in remarks that echoed Brazilian President Lula De Silva’s describing state oil company, Petrobras, as “A pretty but shy teenage girl.”
Camanchaca’s parent company is about to sell-down in Santiago ahead of listing in Oslo. Garcia had high praise for the Norwegian capital and its exchange.
“Oslo is the main market for salmon companies in the world, not only in number of companies, but also in analysts and investors”, Garcia told the newspaper, pointing to Marine Harvest’s USD 8.3 billion market capitalization.
He explained the timing of Camanchaca’s Santiago-Oslo IPO: “The capital markets in the world are enthusiastic. There is attraction for the sector. It has been digesting the regulatory change that occurred in the sector in Chile in 2016. There is more confidence. We are in a good moment,” Garcia said. He’ll chair a Salmones board that’ll include 30-year industry veteran, Jorge Fernandez Valdes.
Jorge Andrés Fernández García, Fernandez Valdes’ son, will be general manager of the newly listed entity.
Interestingly, Garcia said the price of salmon was “well defined” on the Oslo market and he suggested that this would reinforce the listing’s value. The Salmones business — which Garcia revealed was the parent’s made income earner — is expected to provide a boost to a parent company anticipating “a leap” in value from its current “worth” of USD 370 million.
