Sanne succumbs to £1.5bn private equity bid

THE race for fund administrator Sanne heated up yesterday after the board revealed it will back a £1.5bn offer from industry giant Apex.

The Jersey-based company, a member of the FTSE 250 index, said it had indicated it would recommend the suitor’s 920p-pershare offer if it formalised its bid, helping push shares up 7.6pc, or 64p, to 908p.

The bid is higher than the 875p that private equity firm Cinven offered last month and investors are now anticipating a bidding war for the business.

Yesterday, Sanne revealed it was in ‘advanced discussions’ with Apex over the bid, which is valued at 52.6pc more than Sanne’s share price before offers started to come in for the company.

Apex, a fund services group with 5,000 employees across 50 offices, is also ‘well advanced’ with its due diligence checks and is working to ‘complete the review as quickly as possible’.

A Sanne spokesman added: ‘The board of Sanne has indicated to Apex that the possible offer is at a value that the board would recommend, should a firm intention to make an offer be announced on such terms.’

The company became a target after its share price languished, falling from a December 2019 high of 728p to a 2021 low of 538p.

Apex now has until the end of the working day on August 30 to make a formal offer for Sanne, or withdraw from the bidding.

The news has put Apex – which was established in Bermuda in 2003 – into pole position over Cinven, which has seen five separate approaches for the company rebuffed.

Cinven’s offers were labelled as ‘opportunistic’. It has until 5pm on Friday to firm up its most recent offer for the company, which is worth 875p per share, or £1.4bn.