(Reuters) — Starboard Value, Smithfield Food’s biggest shareholder with a 5.7 percent stake, has urged the world’s largest pork producer to explore a breakup instead of a planned $4.7 billion takeover by Chinese meat company Shuanghui International.
The activist investor said Smithfield might be worth “well in excess” of the $34 per share offered by Shuanghui if it split into hog production, pork and international units and shopped the businesses separately.
