Hat tip to Olly "Shahsy" Shah for landing the first ever on the record interview in a British newspaper with Daniel Kretinsky, the energy tycoon dubbed the Czech Sphinx.
Kretinsky has been building large stakes in some of Britain's biggest companies, such as J Sainsbury and Royal Mail...
If you are still wondering what Bestway and its owners are up to with their stakebuilding efforts in J Sainsbury then I suggest reading Neil "Neily" Craven's piece in yesterday's Mail on Sunday business section.
Neily has a go at figuring out what is actually going on with Bestway's move on Sainsbury's and arrives at a rather interesting suggestion: that perhaps Bestway are trying to engineer a reverse takeover...
Bestway isn't hanging around.
J Sainsbury has just revealed the wholesale group has increased its stake in the supermarket giant to just under 4.5pc.
The move comes after Bestway announced a 3.45pc shareholding in Sainsbury's last week and reports suggested the privately-owned group's top executives have been weighing a combination with the FTSE 100 retailer.
Below is a link to this morning's announcement:..
Hat tip to Oliver Gill and Chris Price, business hacks at The Daily Telegraph, little old Betaville's former employer.
Gill and Price have actually done some hard work and dug out some cracking on the record quotes from old Colin Graves, the straight-talking founder of budget convenence store company Costcutter, about Bestway's REAL intenstions for J Sainsbury...
Wholesaler Bestway has this morning announced it has purchased a 3.45pc stake in J Sainsbury.
Bestway is led by Sir Anwar Pervez, a former bus conductor and driver. He is now a billionaire, worth around £3.1 billion, according to The Sunday Times rich list...
Rivals at the The Times have landed a cracking tail about how J Sainsbury has appointed uber dealmakers Robey Warshaw as its new "defence" advisor amid speculation it might soon be on the receiving end of a takeover offer (read Betaville's part 1, 2, 3 and 4 if you need reminding of the bid rumours)...
It would appear my old boss Alistair "Mr Acerbic" Osborne has the most sensible things to say about the Apollo - J Sainsbury bid tale circulating the London market...
Sainsbury's shares closed up around 15pc at 340p following the The Sunday Times "scoop" about Apollo going for the supermarket instead of Morrisons.
The thing is: there has been no confirmation from Apollo that it is consdering an offer.
Betaville assumes that for the moment Apollo's interest is simply not that serious, so doesn't warrant the typical confirmation required under Takeover Panel rules...
Rivals at The Sunday Times have this morning gone big on the prospects of Apollo taking a 45-degree right hand turn and launching a multi-billion pound bid for J Sainsbury instead of Morrisons. Below is a link to this morning's business splash "scoop" from retail hack Sam Chambers:
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/bidders-train-guns-on-sainsburys-sh8228nst..
I see my former boss and colleague Alistair "Acerbic" Osborne is today in The Times talking up the prospects of a potential takeover bid for J Sainsbury following the private equity bid battle for rival WM Morrison...