Deals wrap: Nokia rumors but no suitors
Nokia’s plunging share price and persistent speculation it might be a takeover target is far from attracting real suitors interested in saving the struggling mobile phone company, write Victoria Howley and Tarmo Virki.
General Motors is considering putting Opel up for sale again as management is losing confidence that the European arm will return to profitability, two German magazines reported. Here’s a timeline of the twists and turns in Opel’s ownership.
Former BP boss Tony Hayward and financier Nathaniel Rothschild aim to raise around $1.6 billion with a June listing of an acquisition vehicle that will target oil assets.
Samsonite, the world’s biggest luggage maker, narrowed the indicative price range of its Hong Kong initial public offer, the latest sign of weak investor appetite for richly-priced deals.
“While a handful of initial public offerings are hitting the market with a pop, many are landing with a thud,” reports the NYT’s DealBook.
Deals wrap: Just one word – plastics
Plastics. They don’t glitter like gold does, but more top hedge fund managers are betting on the chemical commodities that go into making plastics and buying up shares in the companies that produce them.
The Smart Money 30, a group that includes some of the biggest stock-picking equity funds, also trimmed bets on tech giants Apple and Google while favoring General Motors and Citigroup, according to data compiled by Thomson Reuters.
What’s the easiest way to boost your company’s reputation? Buy up a top global brand. At least that’s the advice being given to top Chinese companies by the country’s commerce minister, who is urging the country’s firms to seek out new foreign acquisitions in an effort to secure more name recognition abroad.
More signs that the luxury market has bounced back from its recession-induced slump. France’s LVMH, the world’s number one luxury group, snapped up widely-popular Italian jewelry maker Bulgari in a deal valued at $5.19 billion as it aims to bulk up its jewelry business and expand in emerging markets. Some analysts say the offer could set off a new wave of consolidation in the luxury market.
Some of the hottest tech startups are clamping down on trading of their shares as the race to snap up pieces of pre-IPO companies has attracted the scrutiny of U.S. regulators, write correspondents Alexei Oreskovic and Liana Baker.
Deals wrap: Looking back on GM’s debut
General Motors’ momentous return to the stock market last week was helped in part by the automaker’s own executives. Several top managers at the top U.S. automaker acquired shares in the IPO and some added to their stakes afterward, led by Chief Executive Dan Akerson and Chairman Ed Whitacre.
Whitacre and Akerson acquired more than $500,000 of GM stock each, taking 800 shares each in the initial public offering and then adding to their stakes afterward in open market transactions, filings with U.S. securities regulators show.
The dramatic debut, the largest IPO in U.S. history, came a year and a half after the U.S. government rescued the automaker and forced a massive overhaul. It also marked the beginning of the end of the government’s 61 percent ownership stake in the company, which the Obama administration said it hopes to shed entirely by mid-to-late 2012. The New York Times reports that Treasury officials faced a tough decision over the public offering price in the days leading up to the listing, torn over how it would define the success or failure of Detroit’s $50 billion bailout.
In Asia, the IPO express looked back on track, with companies from China to Japan reiterating commitments to raise billions of dollars through stock market floats, although market volatility did cut appetites for some deals.
A Thanksgiving deal could be in the works in the U.S. as reports surfaced that private equity firm Apax Partners is near to buying marketer Advantage Sales and Marketing from buyout firm J.W. Childs Associates and Bank of America for $1.8 billion. The transaction could be announced Thursday and close by December 31, a person familiar with the deal told Bloomberg.
(Photo: General Motors CEO Dan Akerson (C) talks to the media from the front seat of a new 2012 Chevrolet Camaro convertible, with New York Stock Exchange CEO Duncan L. Niederauer, outside the NYSE as GM’s common stock begins trading publicly again in New York, November 18, 2010. REUTERS/Emile Wamsteker/General Motors/Handout)
Deals wrap: GM’s market splash
General Motors has raised billions of dollars in its IPO, but big investors still have plenty of cash on hand to plow into other new stock issues — if they have merit.
General Motors’ swift journey from dying company to blockbuster IPO is a remarkable story, which the Democrats received little political credit for.
One of the first signs General Motors was driving toward a record-setting IPO with booming demand from investors came from an unlikely indicator: a sudden shortage of chocolate mousse at an investor meeting.
Harrah’s scrapped its $500 million initial public offering. Sources told Reuters the stock listing was delayed over concerns it would have been priced too high.
KKR is in advanced talks to buy Del Monte Foods, two sources familiar with the situation said.
Read this week’s Thomson Reuters Investment Banking Scorecard here.
Fortune looks into why Dell won’t go private.
Deals wrap: GM debuts
General Motors prepared for a dramatic return to the stock market with what is set to become the world’s largest initial public offering, less than a year and a half after emerging from bankruptcy. “I think it shows that investors think that the worst is over and I agree,” said Morningstar analyst David Whiston about the oversubscribed IPO.
Small investors are clamoring for a piece of General Motors but financial advisers are not confident they will be able to satisfy client demand. The U.S. government says it has achieved its objective and is prepared to relinquish majority ownership in the resurgent carmaker.
View a factbox on GM’s share offering. View a graphic on how GM’s IPO stacks up against the biggest. Read an analysis on the outcome for taxpayers. View a slideshow of GM though the ages.
It is great to see GM back on the NYSE. With all the news about GM, here’s a good article on how Ford’s finance team helped keep it out of bankruptcy:
http://www.financialtrainingpartners.com /comments-on-credit/archives/568
Deals wrap: Strong reception for GM
General Motors raised the common stock portion of its initial public offering by 31 percent, putting the deal on track to raise as much as $22.7 billion. For details on GM’s IPO click here. The NYT reports the IPO does not mark the end of the bailout era and the WSJ takes a look at the numbers behind GM’s valuation.
Britain’s Diageo is poised to be the leader in a race for Fortune Brands’ $8 billion plus Jim Beam spirits business if the U.S. conglomerate is pressed into breaking itself up.
Shares in Actelion soared on reports that the world’s largest biotech firm Amgen is studying a takeover offer for the Swiss drugmaker.
Deals wrap: Ramping up to GM’s IPO
General Motors has increased the preferred stock on offer by 25 percent and raised the price for common stock in its landmark IPO, bringing the U.S. government closer to break-even on a still-controversial bailout of the automaker. NYT’s Andrew Ross Sorkin looks into who should get the credit for GM’s IPO and Dow Jones Newswires cautions investors with a look back to Blackstone’s IPO.
BHP Billiton is still interested in big acquisitions and does not regret spending $875 million pursuing three major deals that collapsed in the past two years, its chairman said.
If two’s a trend, expect more management/private equity buyouts of U.S.-listed Chinese companies — taking advantage of big discounts to peers on the Hong Kong and Chinese stock markets.
Deals wrap: BHP Billiton’s CEO confronts shareholders
BHP Billiton’s boss is likely to face calls next week for a massive share buyback when he faces shareholders in Australia after his third straight failure to pull off a major acquisition.
Investment bankers are pitching to advise Symantec on strategic options as some shareholders push to break up the company, but the software maker has not made a decision to hire bankers and remains on track with its own strategy, sources said.
General Motors is in the final stage of talks to sell equity to Chinese partner SAIC as part of its landmark initial public offering, two people familiar with the matter said.
Sanofi-Aventis’ $18.5 billion pursuit of Genzyme may be a foregone conclusion for many healthcare industry executives and bankers, but few rivals likely will copy the hostile bid. Read more industry news at the Reuters Health Summit runs which runs from November 8-11.
Private equity firms are using dividend recaps as protection against deals going bad, just stop dressing them up as something they are not, writes Dan Primack for Fortune.com.
Deals wrap: Potash Corp repercussions
Australia’s farm sector would have too much of an advantage if BHP Billiton was allowed to buy Potash Corp, argued Canada’s farm minister. While Canada’s decision to block the deal stunned many, most Potash Corp investors seem unperturbed, eying its long-term growth prospects.
Alastair Sharp looks at what Ottawa’s market-rattling decision could mean for Canadian tech giant Research In Motion.
The terms of GM’s upcoming share sale show that, once public, the stock will have to as much as double before its biggest shareholder, the U.S. government, gets close to breaking even, writes columnist Antony Currie.
BHP weill not let any competitors use there rail line to ship Iron Ore in Australia even though they are more than happy to pay and we are supposed to just hand them the keys to what will ammount to a Potash Cartel! I think not!!! If BHP really wants to be in the Potash business, there are lots of green field sites that they can invest in.
Deals wrap: Eying the GM IPO
Top Chinese automaker SAIC Motor Corp is close to making a decision on whether to buy a stake in its long-time partner General Motors, sources told Reuters. The WSJ reports General Motors will not have to pay U.S. federal taxes on up to $50 billion of profits for as long as 20 years. *View WSJ’s timeline on GM
Russian fertilizer group Phosagro wants Russian firms to buy a stake in Potash Corp in an attempt to scupper BHP Billiton’s $39 billion offer awaiting a crucial ruling from the Canadian government.
MUFG is in talks to buy Royal Bank of Scotland’s project financing unit, sources said, in a deal reportedly worth $6.4 billion and aimed at accelerating the overseas expansion of Japan’s biggest bank.
The Deal looks at the private equity shops, accounting and law firms which make up the dealmaking community in Cleveland.
