이 기사는 2020년 05월 12일 08시00분 thebell에 표출된 기사입니다

Woongjin Group agreed to sell its affiliate, Booxen, to private equity firm Centroid Investment Partners as part of efforts to pare down its debt in the wake of its repurchase and subsequent resale of Coway.

Woonjin Co., Ltd., the holding company of the South Korean conglomerate, held a board meeting on May 7 to approve selling its 72 percent stake in Booxen, the country’s number one book distribution company, to Centroid Investment Partners for 49.3 billion won, sources familiar with the matter said. Woongjin will sign a share purchase agreement with the private equity firm this week.

Woongjin initially put Booxen up for sale last year in an effort to raise money to repay debt and improve its balance sheet. Woonjin Group’s financial position has deteriorated sharply since the repurchase of Coway in March last year, which forced the conglomerate to issue new debt totaling 1.6 trillion won to complete the transaction.

Furthermore, Woongjin’s credit rating was downgraded to BBB- last spring as one of its affiliates, Woongjin Energy, filed for court protection, which has led to cooling demand for the holding company’s bonds. To repay debt that matured in the second half of last year, Woonjin borrowed 105 billion won from OK Capital at a rate of 6.5 percent a year against its stock holdings.

After all, Woongjin put Coway up for sale again, hoping to ease pressure on its financial stability. But the water purifier rental company was sold to Netmarble late last year at a price that was far below Woongjin Group’s target valuation, resulting in more than 100 billion won of loss to the conglomerate.

This led to Woongjin restarting a sale process for Booxen earlier this year. It has reached an agreement with Centroid Investment in a private deal. The proceeds from the sale, combined with 52.5 billion won earned from capital reduction and dividend of its subsidiary Woongjin Thinkbig, would be sufficient to repay debt borrowed from OK Capital that will mature in August.

The Booxen deal includes a call option so that Woongjin could buy back the book distribution company in the future after recovering from financial difficulties. It can exercise the call option at a price that guarantees a certain level of return during the first three years after the sale, and afterwards at a market value when Centroid wants to exit the investment.

Woongjin Group will likely scrap a plan to sell its theme park business, Woongjin Playdoci, as it secured enough money from the sale of Booxen to pare down its debt.

(By reporter Jo Se-hun)