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Blackrock agreed to buy two main ports on the Panama Canal from its owner based in Hong Kong as part of an agreement of $ 22.8 billion, after the pressure of Donald Trump on a Chinese influence alleged to the navigable track.
As an apparent reference to the ports, the American president has often allegedly alleged that “China directs the Panama Canal”, adding last month that “we will take it back, or something very powerful will happen”.
Under the agreement, the owner of Hong Kong of Ports, CK Hutchison, would sell the company to a consortium, in particular Blackrock, Global Infrastructure Partners and Terminal Investment Limited, according to a press release from the company.
In a large -scale investment in the sector, the consortium would buy a 90% participation in the company which owns and operates the two ports in Panama.
The agreement includes a participation of 80% of the subsidiaries of CK Hutchison ports, which manage 43 ports in 23 countries, including in the United Kingdom and Germany. He also manages ports in Southeast Asia, the Middle East, Mexico and Australia.
The remaining participation of 20% is owned by the port operator PSA, which belongs to Temasek, the Singapore Sovereign Wealth Fund.
CK Hutchison said it expected to receive species of more than $ 19 billion from the agreement, a figure which includes the reimbursement of certain loans for shareholders. CK Hutchison market capitalization is $ 148 billion HK ($ 19 billion).
The transaction is “of a purely commercial nature and entirely unrelated to the recent political reports concerning the ports of Panama,” said CK Hutchison co-management director Frank Six.
Controlled by the richest man in Hong Kong Li Ka-Shing and his family, CK Hutchison has a portfolio of ports, retail, telecommunications and other infrastructures. Port operations represented approximately 9% of the total turnover of CK Hutchison of $ 461.6 billion HK in 2023.
The canal has become a flash point in the first 100 days of Trump, while the American president seeks to extend the country’s borders and take control of infrastructure assets – American allies and countries that had benefited from decades of free trade.
The agreement with BlackRock comes after the acquisition by the asset manager of GIP, which helped make the company an investment force in infrastructure.
