DealZone Daily
For the latest deals news from Reuters, click here. And here’s the top stories from the newspapers (some external links may require subscription):
John Tiner, former head of the Financial Services Authority, and now chief executive of Resolution – the investment vehicle established by Clive Cowdery — said his company is targeting pure asset management businesses in its quest to create an enlarged British life assurance and fund management group, the FT said.
LLoyds Banking Group is in talks with stockbroker Execution about creating a joint venture as it plans to build a sizeable presence in the UK equity broking market, the Times said.
Deals du Jour
Clive Cowdery’s Resolution has won over shareholders of Friends Provident, agreeing to pay 1.86 billion pounds for the British life insurer. Here are some facts about the pair. Whether the move will lead to a wave of consolidation in the sector remains to be seen, though last week the head of rival Standard Life told Reuters that it had no plans to make any deals.
Other M&A news today includes:
The total value of distressed-debt deals totalled $84.4 billion this year, the Wall Street Journal said, almost double the figure last year. Here’s Reuters’ story.
Private equity fund Dubai International Capital and distressed debt investor Oaktree Capital have abandoned plans to team up to restructure the debts of German aluminium firm Almatis, the Financial Times said.
India’s GMR group is considering listing its global holding firm on the London Stock Exchange as a step towards building a global asset portfolio worth $10 billion, the Business Standard reported.
IPO by U.K. buyout firm an ocean apart
It’s enough to make Leon Black, Henry Kravis and Stephen Schwarzman jealous.
UK-based buyout firm Resolution, founded by entrepreneur Clive Cowdery, has not only launched a rare IPO – it raised £600 billion ($889 million) last week- but the deal enjoyed a 15 percent “pop” in its trading debut on the London Stock Exchange Wednesday.
The buyout fund will target U.K. insurance and asset management companies in deals in the range of £3 to 5 billion. And that may be part of why the IPO did well: The U.K. insurance sector has underperformed the market with companies contending with lower valuations.
The deal was only the fifteenth IPO to list in London this year, where new issues in 2008 have raised only $8.9 billion, down 78 percent this year, according to Thomson Reuters data, and the fourth largest. The U.S. market for IPOs is down by about the same for the year.
The deal’s success came in stark contrast to the cold shoulder the IPO market in the U.S. has given financial companies, including private equity firms.
Apollo Management, which used the private placement market in August 2007 to begin trading stocks, filed to transfer its shares to the New York Stock Exchange in April, while Kohlberg Kravis Roberts has postponed its complicated plan to use the Amsterdam-based listing of a subsidiary to list on the NYSE.
But then again, with the performance of rival Blackstone Group – its shares are down 70 percent so far this year, who can blame investors for sitting on the sidelines? And it’s been a brutal year for private equity firms with little improvement in sight.
