Canadian convenience giant Couche-Tard has made an $8.6 billion takeover offer for struggling Australian petrol retailer Caltex.
Caltex confirmed in a ASX announcement on Tuesday it had received an “unsolicited, conditional, confidential, non-binding and indicative proposal” from the Laval-based firm which operates 5,000 stores across Canada, the United States, Europe, Mexico, Japan, China, and Indonesia.
Couche-Tard’s offer would see it acquire all of Caltex’s shares by way of a scheme of arrangement at an indicative cash price of $34.50 cash per share less any dividends declared by Caltex.
Shares in Caltex were trading at $29.79 on close Monday.
“The proposal followed an earlier approach from ACT [Alimentation Couche-Tard at an indicative cash price of $32.00 per share, which was rejected on the basis that the indicative price was inadequate,” Caltex said.
The proposal will permit Caltex to pay a special dividend or other distribution and was subject to a number of conditions.
They include Couche-Tard doing due diligence, organising necessary financing for the transaction, no material asset sales, divestments or similar transactions and the Canadian group obtaining Foreign Investment Review Board approval.
The takeover would also need unanimous recommendation by Caltex’s board and approval from Couche-Tard’s board.
The offer of $34.50 per share represents a premium of 15.8 per cent as of last close which comes after an earlier bid of $32.00 per share which Caltex had rejected.
Extracted from The Sydney Morning Herald