NAGOYA (Kyodo) Toyota Motor Corp. has sold its entire stake of some 100,000 shares in Nippon Broadcasting System Inc. on the market after Fuji Television Network Inc. closed its public tender offer for the radio broadcaster on March 7, sources said Thursday.
The shares Toyota held accounted for about 0.3 percent of total outstanding shares in Nippon Broadcasting, the subject of a fierce takeover battle between Fuji TV and Internet service firm Livedoor Co. since early February.
Fear that NBS would be delisted from the second section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange amid the takeover battle might have prompted Toyota to unload all its shares in the radio company, the sources said.
Unlike other shareholders that have come out publicly in support of one side or the other, Toyota simply put its shares on the market.
Before Fuji TV's public tender offer closed, a senior Toyota official had said the automaker would wait and see, and not respond to the tender offer or sell its shares on the market.