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Suzuki buys back VW shares

September 17, 2015

Japanese carmaker Suzuki has bought back all Volkswagen shares, ending a year of bitter talks on ending a failed partnership that started back in 2009. Investors in the Asian auto maker welcomed the move.

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VW, Suzuki logos
Image: AP/Michael Probst

Suzuki confirmed Thursday it had bought back all 111.6 million shares from Volkswagen for 460 billion yen (3.4 billion euros, $3.8 billion).

In August, the International Court of Arbitration, part of the International Chamber of Commerce, had sided with the Japanese carmaker, ruling that Germany's VW must sell its complete stake after both companies had declared that their partnership had no future.

Suzuki and VW teamed up in 2009 with the aim of developing joint compact cars. Also, Volkswagen was keen on starting a partnership with the Japanese auto maker in the hope to get a foot in the Indian market where Suzuki had a dominant market position.

Bitter, but unavoidable move

But the two firms' cooperation turned sour after a while, not yielding the desired results and Suzuki dropping out of the deal in 2001.

German automaker VW takes a stake in Japanese carmaker Suzuki

Since then, it had sought to get back VW's near-20-percent stake in the company that had made the Germans the Japanese company's largest shareholder.

Chairman Osamu Suzuki had said he was satisfied with the arbitration court's decision. "This ruling is based on the principle that contracts must be fundamentally rescindable."

hg/tko (AFP, dpa)