Aussie M&A silly season gets sillier
04/06/2021 03:32
(The author is a Reuters Breakingviews columnist. The opinions
expressed are his own.)
By Antony Currie
MELBOURNE, June 4 (Reuters Breakingviews) - Link Group and
investment bank Barrenjoey managed to get a better IPO deal for
PEXA. But Roc Partners’ brawl over Vitalharvest is getting
messier, and Betmakers’ $3 bln bid for a Tabcorp unit is blowing
up. It sends a message to this unusually fractious market: “Calm
down.”
Full view will be published shortly.
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CONTEXT NEWS
- Shares in Betmakers Technology had fallen 35% by midday
trading on June 4 since the company offered A$4 billion ($3.1
billion) on May 28 for the wagering and media unit of Tabcorp.
The now-A$890 million Betmakers said it would finance
three-quarters of the deal with new stock it intends to issue at
a 15% premium to the 10-day volume-weighted trading average.
- The investing and real assets unit of Macquarie Bank on
June 1 made its ninth offer for Vitalharvest Freehold Trust. At
A$1.295 per unit, it exceeds by half a cent Roc Partners’ eighth
offer for the company on May 26. Roc stated at the time that it
“intends to overbid” any subsequent MIRA offer by 1 cent per
unit. MIRA has the right to match or beat any Roc offer within
five business days.
- On May 31 Link Group confirmed that PEXA, a
mortgage-settlement firm in which it owns a 44% stake, is to
launch an initial public offering after securing some
cornerstone investors. The IPO gives PEXA an enterprise value of
A$3.3 billion just above the A$3.1 billion offered by a KKR-led
consortium on May 27. Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Partners
owns 40% of PEXA and Commonwealth Bank of Australia the
remainder.
- For previous columns by the author, Reuters customers can
click on CURRIE/
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Betmakers Group offer for Tabcorp unit https://www.asx.com.au/asxpdf/20210528/pdf/44wwq5zt6n6tz4.pdf
Latest MIRA offer for Vitalharvest https://www.vitalharvest.com.au/site/PDF/57fd2464-e251-4e0b-bfef-8de41bdf1ebf/AcceptanceofNinthMAFMOffer
Latest Roc offer for Vitalharvest https://www.vitalharvest.com.au/site/PDF/23745527-ba85-4dc9-9517-27c57eb3082a/ReceiptofRocofferof129
Link Group on PEXA IPO https://investors.linkgroup.com/DownloadFile.axd?file=/Report/ComNews/20210531/02379720.pdf
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| Editing by Pete Sweeney and Sharon Lam)
((antony.currie@thomsonreuters.com; Reuters Messaging:
antony.currie.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net))