Michelin's Romanian employees invest abroad

The Romanian employees of tyre maker Michelin bought 250,000 euros’ worth in the group’s shares, traded on the international market.
Nearly 70% of the 3,500 Romanian employees, that is 2,320 people, bought shares of the French company for a preferential price, Cristina Hanganu, Michelin Romania’s PR manager told Ziarul Financiar.
In other words, every employee that subscribed to this offering spent an average of more than 100 euros, i.e. about an average net salary in the economy, on shares.
“A discount scheme was put in place so that the first 20 shares were possible to buy for 11.5 euros each, the next 20 cost 15.3 euros, while anything above this threshold cost 23 euros, as compared to the 28.17 euro average price on the market in the month before the offering. The employees in Romania bought 8.6 shares each on the average. We’ve had some people that bought only one share just to become a Michelin shareholder,” Hanganu explained.
The employees cannot make money from the shares purchased unless collecting dividends, because they may not sell them any time soon. “The employees may not sell right away because they got the shares at preferential prices and were even allowed to pay for them in instalments. They will be allowed to sell them as early as in five years from now, but may sell them right away only in case of an emergency (i.e. death of a family member or marriage),” Hanganu specified. She added the shares could be sold on the Paris Bourse, with the transactions handled by a Michelin-paid broker. Michelin is not the first to do this in Romania, though. Lafarge Romania and McDonald’s Romania have conducted similar programmes in the past, as well.
Michelin is one of the world’s leading tyre producers, as annual sales amount to 15.6bn euros and the number of employees reaches over 100,000. bogdan.neagu@zf.ro