Experience

Sale of Latin American Company

Sociedad Punta de Lobos S.A.

Chadbourne represented the owners of Sociedad Punta de Lobos (SPL) in the sale of the company to K+S Aktiengesellschaft (K+S), a German public company that is one of the world's leading suppliers of fertilizers and salt products. The purchase price was approximately $450 million.

Headquartered in Santiago, Chile, SPL is Latin America’s largest salt producer, which has 10,000 years worth of salt reserves. It obtains most of its salt from a mine in the Atacama Desert, in the north of Chile. The sellers included a group of Chilean private equity investors led by Jose Yuraszeck, Chile's highest profile entrepreneur, and Citicorp International Finance Corp., a New York-based entity which is part of Citicorp's international private equity arm.

Both SPL and K+S have significant operations in various countries throughout the world. As a result, the transaction had to be approved by the antitrust authorities of Germany, Chile, the United States and Brazil. In addition, governmental and civil antitrust claims in Chile had to be settled before closing.