A cheeky website about deals, dealmakers and anything else I find interesting. Edited by Ben Harrington. If you have a tip, want to discuss a story or have a subscription enquiry please feel free to email Betaville at [email protected]. Betaville can also be reached at Whats App, Signal or Telegram. Betaville's Twitter handle is @bharringtonw11 and you can message me via Twitter with stories.
Loyal readers might recall little old Betaville published an UNCOOKED Alert a few weeks ago about how Covestro's sale talks with the Abu Dhabi National Oil Corporation weren't going that well.
That resulted in little old Betaville getting it in the neck from a variety of quarters and some of it was in rather foul language...
Twitter can be a pretty horrendous place these days.
But you can still find the odd nugget of something interesting or useful among the whingeing, rowing and sometimes, quite frankly, harrowing images.
It takes, though, a certain type of person to know how to find and present that interesting or useful piece of information on Twitter and I'm not just talking about little old Betaville...
Punchy stuff from Mark "The Kleinmanator" Kleinman of Sky News, who appears to be having a go at the City of London's disclosure rules and Takeover Code in today's City AM column...
Rivals at Debtwire and Mergermarket have picked up on little old Betaville's scoopette about the potential £100 million sale of British pet food retailer Jollyes.
According Debtwire's Josh O'Neil, the private equity owners of supermarket giant Asda, TDR Capital, have been in exclusive talks with Jollyes owner Kester Capital about a takeover of the business...
I see arch rivals at Bloomberg decided to publish the Dyne Therapeutics Inc takeover story little old Betaville has been chasing for the last few weeks.
According to Bloomie, Dyne Therapeutics has been "speaking with advisers as it consider options including a possible sale or partnership". Below is a link to the full story:..
MorphoSys AG, the Germany and US listed biopharmaceutical company, is at the centre of takeover talk.
People following the situation have heard rumours MorphoSys AG has been working with investment banking advisers after receiving takeover interest.
The interest in MorphoSys is said to have come from three large pharmaceutical firms, said people following the situation...
I see my former colleague Mark "The Kleinmanator" Kleinman of Sky News has followed up little old Betaville's UNCOOKED alert about the takeover rumours surrounding Serco...
Bears are coming out of the woods despite the ongoing equity market rally.
And it's another Sweden-listed company that is on the receiving end of a mauling from Viceroy Reseach, the activist short seller led by Fraser Perring.
As usual, the note from Viceroy about Svenska Cellulosa AB SCA, a timber, pulp and paper manufacturer, is a little bit too fruity to be aired on these pixels so I have pasted the link below...
Amy-Jo Crowley's overnight scoop about KPS Capital's unrequited interest in Elementis has riled up one of the London-listed chemical company's largest shareholders somewhat.
Steve Raineri and Chris Meeker, portfolio managers at Franklin Mutual Advisers, have been pushing for the board of Elementis to carry out a strategic review since late last year...
So there is another suitor pursuing London-listed chemicals company Elementis.
According to a scoop from Amy-Jo Crowley of Reuters, New York-based buy out firm KPS Capital recently explored a takeover bid for Elementis though it has since "paused" its work on the deal. Below is a link to Amy-Jo's top tale:..
There aren't too many fully fledged private equity auction processes kicking off at the moment due to the potential "macroeconomic nasties" lurking around the corner.
But little old Betaville has been doing some digging around and encountered one potential private equity sale process that may be about to start over the next few weeks...
eEnergy, the London-listed listed net zero digital services provider, this morning announced it has sold its energy management division for £29.1 million, thereby confirming one aspect of little old Betaville's UNCOOKED alert from December 2023.
I have pasted the link below to this morning's announcement and the link to December's UNCOOKED Alert:..
I see France-listed gaming operator La Francaise des Jeux has finally confirmed little old Betaville's UNCOOKED Alert from last year about its interest in purchasing Nordic gaming group Kindred.
In case you don't recall, little old Betaville revealed back in August La Francaise des Jeux was plotting a takeover bid for Kindred. Below is the link to that piece:..
Consolidation among London-listed REITs continues.
This morning Custodian Property Income REIT is acquiring ABRDN Property Income Trust for £237 million with its own stock, which is a premium of around 30pc.
It looks like Custodian Property Income REIT's shareholders will end up with the lion's share of the equity in the new company, so I'm not sure this really is a "merger" as billed in the announcement...
The first fully fledged new takeover deal of a sizeable UK-listed company of 2024 has just been announced this morning.
France-based Ceva Logistics has had a 450p a share - or around £765 million - takeover offer for haulage and logistics group Wincanton recommended by the the London-listed company's board...
Little old Betaville isn't a great fan of headlines with a question mark in them.
But sometimes they serve a purpose, such as in this case about a mysterious stakebuilding taking place in London-listed housebuilder Crest Nicholson.
A loyal reader got in touch to point out that Jersey-based vehicle called Shanlis Investment Unlimited has quietly accumulated a 6pc shareholding in Crest Nicholson...
Frasers Group - the retailer controlled by the British billionaire Mike Ashley - is back at it.
Yesterday, it emerged that Frasers Group had increased its stake again Asos, the London-listed online retailer, after reducing its shareholding last October.
Frasers Group said it now owns 24.1pc of Asos. Below is the link to the announcement:..
[Disclaimer - the information on Betaville does not consitute any form of investment recommendation and is not intended to be relied upon by readers in making, or refraining from, any investment decisions].