| dc.description.abstract | Firms conducting mergers and acquisitions (M&As) require fair and unbiased evalua-tion on the equity value of target firms. However, a common drawback of extant re-search in Taiwan is only employing the discounted cash flow (DCF) method for the evaluation, as opposed to the practical standards which require the use of at least two methods so as to minimize impacts from possible biases and mistakes. Moreover, alt-hough some recent literature does employ both DCF and the market methods for evalu-ation, they fail to consider two important aspects, i.e., large shareholders of the target firm may require a control premium, and shares of private target firm lack liquidity of transaction. In contrast, this study will focus on these two aspects so as to conclude a fair and unbiased equity value of the target firm.
This study will employ both DCF and the market methods for evaluation of a specific target firm, Firm A. I first use the DCF method for evaluation since Firm A has operated in the semiconductor industry for considerable time with stable profits. Therefore, its value can be derived based on reasonable predictions on future cash flows, while dis-counting them with a rate which incorporates the risk profile of the company. I then use the market method for valuing Firm A since the semiconductor industry in Taiwan is mature enough that I am certain with the position of Firm A in the product stream of the industry, and the information of comparable companies is available to be obtained from public dataset.
In details, I intend to investigate the value of the target Firm A, an unlisted semiconduc-tor equipment agent company, from the perspective of the acquirer, a publicly listed semiconductor equipment company. After employing both DCF and the market meth-ods for evaluation, I further add the optimal ＂control premium＂ for large shareholders of Firm A, and then deduct “discount for lack of marketability＂ (DLOM) from share value of Firm A. I then conclude by integrating results from both methods and form a final suggestion for the share value of Firm A.
The rationales for further adjustments are as follows. First, as Firm A plans to sell more than 50% of its equity shares to the acquirer, I need to add the ＂control premium＂ to the unadjusted results from two evaluation methods. According to most recent statistics provided by Mergerstat®/BVR Study, the value of Firm A should include the median control premium of 22.5% in the “equipment industry” (with Standard Industrial Classi-fication, SIC code 3559).
In addition, I deduct DLOM from the value of Firm A since it is unlisted and thus lack-ing the transaction liquidity in the market. A reasonable proxy for DLOM is the under-writer′s fees assuming Firm A conducts Initial Public Offerings (IPO). Therefore, I em-ploy Pratt (2009)’s estimate for the underwriter′s expected fee for small companies to be 15%. After taking both the control premium and DLOM into account, I suggest that the per share value for Firm A should be in the range between TWD104.83 and TWD114.89. | en_US |