INTERNATIONAL. “We don’t comment on market rumours.” That was the response from Avolta this morning (7 May) to The Moodie Davitt Report when asked about a Sky News report earlier today claiming CVC Capital Partners is weighing a £6 billion (US$8 billion) takeover bid.
The Moodie Davitt Report has also approached CVC, a leading global private markets manager, for comment.
CVC is focused on private equity, secondaries, credit and infrastructure with a global network of 30 local offices and €200 billion (US$267 billion) of assets under management.
Sky News said it had learnt that CVC is at the early stages of considering an offer for Swiss Stock Exchange-listed Avolta.
“Any takeover proposal could be made in conjunction with the billionaire Benetton family, which holds a large minority stake in the company following the merger of Autogrill and Dufry in 2023,” it wrote.
The report continued: “Sources close to the situation said it was far from certain that CVC would make a formal approach to take Avolta private. They added that it was also not clear whether members of the Benetton family would participate in any deal.
“Alessandro Benetton, a former Autogrill board member, serves as Avolta’s Honorary Chairman.” ✈
Comment: One has to take a guarded approach to such stories, writes Martin Moodie. The ‘where there’s smoke there’s fire’ adage is not sufficient as financial markets are full of speculation every day.
But the reputation of the reporter here (Mark Kleinman, who has revealed some of the biggest stories in the City in the past decade, with a string of exclusives about major takeover deals) means the story warrants close scrutiny.
Kleinman broke three of the biggest stories of the year in 2021, including football’s European Super League breakaway, the collapse of Arcadia Group and the £5 billion potential takeover of supermarket chain Morrisons). He is a seriously good journalist, not one prone to wild speculation.
His report (weirdly illustrated by a Heinemann façade at Sydney Airport), contained the usual riders (e.g. ‘Sources close to the situation said it was far from certain that CVC would make a formal approach’) but no substantial detail.
As you would expect, Avolta told us, “We don’t comment on market rumours.” CVC have yet to respond to us but will use similar semantics.
So how does such a story get into the media? I speak from experience in saying the answer is simple: someone wants it to. That can be for a variety of motivations, whether or not the likelihood of CVC mounting a bid is likely. It’s a classic case not only of watch this space but also the various players that inhabit it (or want to). ✈
