(This is not an actionable idea.)

Global Sources has announced its intention to tender for its shares at $10.00/share (press release ).  The shares currently trade at $7.93, well below the tender price.  Global Sources has had two tender offers in the past.  If history repeats itself, then the tender offer will be massively oversubscribed.  Effectively, the tender offer will like a special dividend.

So why am I sitting this one out?

There are things about the company that dont sit well with me.  Firstly, offshore money is involved.  Pump and dump schemes seem to be correlated with the use of offshore entities.  While I cant tell you if Global Sources was originally a pump and dump, there was an offshore entity involved for most of Global Sources history as a publicly-traded company.

On May 31, 2000 an entity called Hung Lay Si Co. Ltd. owned 16,035,388 shares, roughly 61.0% of shares outstanding.  The 20-F filing describes this entity:

Hung Lay Si Co Ltd. is a company organized under the laws of the Cayman Islands. It is wholly owned by the Quan Gung 1986 Trust, a trust formed under the laws of the Island of Jersey.

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we do not know and may never know the identity of the beneficiaries or settlors of the Quan Gung 1986 Trust.

There are other things about Global Sources that turn me off.

1. Lots of related party transactions.  For example, the YE2007 20-F states that the company reimbursed related parties for the use of club memberships.  The YE2002 20-F lists club memberships under Other Assets for YE2002 and YE2001.  Club memberships do not seem to be mentioned in other areas of the YE2002 20-F (such as the section for related party transactions).
2. Numerous real estate deals.  While real estate consists of a large portion of Global Sources assets, the investor presentations do not seem to talk about them much.  There also doesnt seem to be much information on the location of these buildings.
3. Insiders may face few or no legal consequences if they do something that they shouldnt do.  One of the risk factors state: Because we are governed by Bermuda law rather than the laws of the United States, our shareholders may have more difficulty protecting their rights because of differences in the laws of the jurisdictions.
4. Share ownership of Merle and Hung Lay Si combined have dropped a lot since the company first became public.
5. Investor presentations talk about non-GAAP/non-IFRS earnings where share-based compensation isnt treated like a real expense.  This strikes me as promotional.
6. The companys capital allocation strategy doesnt seem to make a lot of sense to me.  Profits from the operating business have gone towards buying real estate without any leverage.  This does not seem like a good use of shareholder capital as unleveraged real estate typically has very low rates of return.  The companys core business seems to have wonderful economics.  The company should probably return profits to shareholders via share repurchases or dividends instead of buying real estate.

The underlying business seems to be a wonderful business.  However, I am turned off by this companys origins and I dont feel like playing with fire.

*Disclosure: No position.