Olin and Huntsman shareholders clear the merger; the regulators have not been asked yet
Preliminary counts put roughly 97 percent of Olin votes cast and 99 percent of Huntsman votes cast behind the all-stock merger of equals. Both companies call the tallies preliminary, both still owe the SEC a certified result, and the closing they are working to is in the first half of 2027.
Olin Corporation and Huntsman Corporation told the market at 11:30 Eastern this morning that shareholders on both sides have approved the proposals needed to complete the all-stock merger of equals the two companies had previously announced.
The margins were not close. On preliminary results from the Olin special meeting held today, roughly 97 percent of the votes cast, representing 81 percent of all outstanding shares, favoured consummating the transaction through a direct merger of Olin and Huntsman. At the Huntsman stockholders' meeting, again on preliminary results, roughly 99 percent of votes cast and 75 percent of outstanding shares were in favour.
Both figures are preliminary by the companies' own description. Final results await certification by each company's independent inspector of elections and will be reported in separate Current Reports on Form 8-K. Neither of those reports was on file with the Securities and Exchange Commission when this piece was published; the most recent filings from either company on the transaction were the joint Rule 425 communication and the Item 8.01 reports both registrants lodged on the evening of 17 August.
The vote is a condition removed, not a deal closed. The companies said the transaction is expected to close in the first half of 2027 and remains subject to required regulatory approvals and to the satisfaction or waiver of other customary closing conditions. In a combination between two chlorine, epoxy and polyurethanes producers with overlapping customer bases, it is the approvals rather than the shareholder register that still stand between today and that window, and neither company has said how long those reviews will take.
“We greatly appreciate the strong support of Olin and Huntsman shareholders as we reach this important milestone,” said Ken Lane, President and Chief Executive Officer of Olin, describing the combined OlinHuntsman Corporation as “a more value-focused chemicals company with a world-scale vertically integrated platform”. Peter Huntsman, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer of Huntsman, said the company would be “better positioned to compete in an increasingly global industry” and thanked shareholders for support he called overwhelming.
What the two sides bring is complementary rather than duplicative in the obvious places. Olin is a vertically integrated producer of chlorine and caustic soda, vinyls, epoxies, chlorinated organics, bleach, hydrogen and hydrochloric acid, and through Winchester it is also a leading US manufacturer of sporting and law-enforcement ammunition — an asset with no chemical logic in a merger of this kind, and one the companies did not address today. Huntsman's businesses sit further down the same chain in polyurethanes and performance products.
For anyone holding either equity, today changed one thing and left the rest where it was: the owners have said yes, the regulators have not been asked to say anything yet, and the closing window the companies are working to still sits in the first half of next year.