Shareholders of United States Steel voted overwhelmingly on 12 April 2024 to approve the company's 14.9 billion dollar acquisition by Japan's Nippon Steel, clearing a key milestone for the deal. More than 98 percent of the shares voted at the special meeting were cast in favour of the merger agreement, representing about 71 percent of the shares outstanding. Under the agreement announced on 18 December 2023, Nippon Steel will pay 55 dollars a share in cash for the 123-year-old American steelmaker. The vote came two days after the US Department of Justice opened an in-depth antitrust investigation into the takeover, and the deal still faced political opposition, with President Joe Biden saying it was vital for U.S. Steel to remain domestically owned and operated. Nippon Steel has pledged to keep the company's headquarters in Pittsburgh and to protect jobs, and the companies said they expected the transaction to close in the second half of 2024.
Source: Nasdaq (U.S. Steel press release) — https://www.nasdaq.com/press-release/u.-s.-steel-stockholders-approve-transaction-with-nippon-steel-corporation-nsc-2024
Photo: Wikimedia Commons (freely licensed).