UK Public M and A Update Q2 2021 review
14 July 2021
Overview
14 firm offers were announced in Q2 2021 (compared to 13 in Q1 2021 and 17 in Q4 2020), with a combined offer value of approximately £10.16 billion (representing a decrease from £12.67 billion in Q1 2021). Of those 14 offers, 10 were all cash.
In the last quarter, Ashurst's global public M&A mandates included advising:
- Ramsay Health Care on the final and increased £1.04 billion recommended cash offer for Spire Healthcare Group plc;
- Equitix and Goldman Sachs on the $2 billion recommended cash offer for John Laing Group plc by KKR;
- Rothschild & Co on the final and increased £1.27 billion recommended cash offer for St. Modwen Properties plc;
- Rothschild & Co on the £70.4 million recommended cash offer for Wey Education plc;
- Oxford Instruments plc on the €42 million offer for WITec Wissenschaftliche Instrumente und Technologie GmbH;
- Barclays and Citigroup on the €1.57 billion hostile cash offer from CPI Property Group S.A. and Aroundtown SA for Globalworth Real Estate Investments Limited ; and
- Galaxy Resources on the proposed A$4 billion merger with Orocobre Limited.
| Announced bids | 14 |
| Recommended on announcement | 12 |
| Schemes of arrangement | 12 |
| Average of bid premia (% unweighted) | 36.61% |
| Average of bid premia (% weighted) | 26.12% |
Q2 was relatively quiet from a regulatory and legal perspective with news items covering amendments to the Takeover Code to replace gender specific terms with gender neutral terms, various appointments to the Panel Executive (including Ian Hart from UBS as the new Director General), and two legal updates in relation to takeovers implemented by way of scheme of arrangement.
Further details of these developments are set out in the News digest on page 2 of this publication.
In addition, as noted in our 2020 Annual Update and the Q1 2021 Update, the proposed amendments to the Code regarding conditions to offers and the offer timetable as set out in PCP 2020/1 and RS 2020/1 came into force on 5 July 2021, and will apply to all firm offers which are announced under Rule 2.7 of the Code on or after that date. Firm offers announced prior to that date (or which are in competition with a firm offer announced prior to that date) remain subject to the rules that were previously in force prior to that date.
On 28 June 2021, the City of London Law Society and the Law Society of England and Wales published specimen documents to reflect the changes to the Takeover Code.
Further details of these developments are set out in the News digest on pages 2-3 of this publication (which can be downloaded below).
