Huntsman Corp. weighs sale to a potential buyer

Huntsman Corp. confirmed Tuesday that it is considering a sale of the company after receiving overtures from a potential suitor late last year.

Huntsman spokesman Don Olsen said that since late 2005, when the Salt Lake-based chemicals maker was approached by an unnamed prospective buyer, company officials have met with a limited number of other potential buyers and "engaged advisers to assist in evaluating a possible sale of the company, and other alternatives, with an eye always toward enhancing shareholder value."

As of late Tuesday, the company said it hadn't signed any deals.

"Again, a sale is one possibility," Olsen said. "Continuing to operate the company as we have and execute our business plan is another. We have been successfully running the company and executing what has been a very successful plan. Continuing to do so remains a very viable option for the board."

The company's statements were in response to a Wall Street Journal article that hit newsstands earlier in the day, which said Huntsman was in "serious discussions" to be sold for $4.3 billion or more. The story cited sources "familiar with the matter" and speculated that possible purchasers could include buyout firm Apollo Management LP.

Huntsman did not disclose the identities of the companies with which it has met. And Olsen told the Deseret Morning News that Huntsman is "not going to get into naming names."

Wind of the possible deal sent the company's market value rising to $4.77 billion as its stock surged 11 percent, or $2.22, to close at $21.62 per share Tuesday on the New York Stock Exchange.

For now, Huntsman Corp. continues its review process, and, it said in a prepared statement, "does not expect to disclose any further developments with respect to the exploration of strategic alternatives unless and until its board of directors has approved a transaction or other strategic alternative."

Huntsman Corp.'s biggest shareholders are the Huntsman family, at about 24 percent, and MatlinPatterson Asset Management LP, which bought about 35 percent of the then-beleaguered company's shares in early 2005.

Olsen declined to comment on Huntsman Corp. chairman Jon Huntsman Sr.'s opinion of a possible sale, except to say that "we have a board of directors, and anything that happens with the company would have to receive the close scrutiny of the board. Jon Huntsman (Sr.) is on the board, and he is the chairman, so . . . But as to the specific what-ifs and the wherefores and the why-fors, I just don't want to get into that."