(Reuters) – Share prices of COSCO SHIPPING Ports Ltd rose to as much as a three-month high on Thursday, after the German government cleared it to buy part of a Hamburg port-based container terminal, amid a political row over Chinese investment.
The Hong Kong-listed subsidiary of China’s state-owned conglomerate China COSCO SHIPPING Corporation Limited rose as much as 2.4% to HK$6.03 ($0.77), with share prics hitting their highest level since Feb. 2. They stood at a 1.53% gain as end of morning trade session, the sixth-biggest percentage gainer among Hang Seng Composite Index on industrials stocks.
Port logistics firm HHLA said on Wednesday the German government has cleared COSCO SHIPPING Ports’ purchase of a 24.9% stake in the Tollerort container terminal.
A spokesperson for the German government said in a statement that Berlin had informed HHLA and Cosco that their reworked deal was compliant with a cabinet decision in fall 2022 that limits Chinese state firm Cosco’s ownership in the terminal to less than 25%.
The deal was also in line with Berlin’s declaring Tollerort critical infrastructure this year, the statement added.
The German economy ministry said last month that it was reviewing a decision to allow Cosco to take the stake.
China’s foreign ministry at the time urged Germany to be “objective and rational” in its review.
($1 = 7.8489 Hong Kong dollars)
(Reporting by Nilutpal Timsina in Bengaluru, Ludwig Burger in Frankfurt and Roxanne Liu in Beijing; Editing by Aurora Ellis and Gerry Doyle)
