InBev under pressure to raise SABMiller offer
Two of SABMiller largest investors last night said the brewer was right to knock back a £ 65bn takeover approach from rival AB InBev earlier this week, adding to the pressure on the Belgium-listed group to raise its offer price.
Aberdeen Asset Management, SAB’s seventh-largest shareholder with a 1.8 per cent stake, said the 4,215p-a-share approach “significantly undervalues” the London-listed company. Poland’s Kulczyk Investment Corp, which has a 3 per cent stake, also backed the board’s move. Both, how- ever, were in principle positive to the idea of a merger.
SAB shares closed up 27.5p at 3,668.5p yesterday, suggesting that the City believes InBev will have to offer more to seal a deal.
The two sides have been lobbying investors ahead of next Wednesday’s 5pm deadline from the Takeover Panel, which requires Inbev to put up a formal offer or shut up and walk away from a SAB takeover for at least six months.
Altria, SAB’s biggest investor with 27 per cent of the stock, signalled its support for InBev’s latest approach earlier this week. While the secondlargest investor, Colombia’s Santo Domingo family, which controls a key 14 per cent stake, has been silent so far, the two directors it nominates to SAB’s board voted with executives in favour of rebuffing Inbev’s latest proposal.
Sab’s charm offensive in the City came as the Peroni brewer yesterday pledged to double planned cost savings over the next fiveyears to $1bn (£652m). Analysts as Société Générale said: “These are savings that would otherwise form part of InBev’s synergy capture plans. So SAB is arguing – unsurprisingly – that the benefit of those savings should accrue to SAB shareholders, not InBev shareholders.”