Investment bankers focused on Latin America may have had a profitable year so far, but the last quarter looks less than promising against an increasingly rocky backdrop. Optimism in the […]
Category: Equity
Posted inDaily Brief
Banks Suggest Lower Price for UOL Offer
Advisors to Brazil’s Folhapar should offer minority shareholders of its Universo Online (UOL) unit BRL16.83 per share, below the BRL17.00 limit it had set. Folhapar, publisher of the Folha de Sao Paulo newspaper, is attempting to buy up 18.4m ordinary and 30.7m preferred shares, or 41% of the capital, it doesn’t own in order to de-list UOL. At BRL16.83, Folhapar would be looking at spending BRL826m if all holders accept. Bradesco provided the valuation. UOL does not give the timing for the completion of the process.
Posted inDaily Brief
Chiloe Sees Oct-Nov IPO
Cultivos Marinos Chiloe, seen as among the next issuers to IPO in Chile, is aiming for an October or November offering depending on market conditions. The salmon producer has been looking to do the transaction before the September 18 Chilean Independence holiday. “We are looking at the market to see when will be the right time to do it, but it is a question of weeks rather than months,” CEO Ricardo Purcell tells LatinFinance. The issuer has not set a size, but Purcell says it should be a 33% float. The company plans to use the proceeds to help finance its $170m investment plan. Builder Ingevec is another Chilean debutant at the front of the list, with the market awaiting a rescheduling of the IPO that was to have taken place in August. Celfin is managing the Chiloe sale, while Larrain Vial has the Ingevec mandate.
Posted inDaily Brief
EI Moves into Colombia
Equity International (EI), the investment vehicle founded by Gary Garrabrant and billionaire Sam Zell, has made a $75m investment in Colombian developer Terranum Development. The stake in the privately-held corporate real estate specialist is EI’s first venture into the Andean nation. Privately-held Terranum Development has a pipeline and portfolio totaling $500m and is a part of real estate developer Terranum, co-owned by boutique investment bank Estrategias Corporativas and the Santo Domingo family. EI has been active in Brazilian real estate, owning part of BR Malls and recently exiting a position in homebuilder Gafisa.
Posted inDaily Brief
Pemex Ups Stake in Repsol
Pemex plans to raise its position in Spain’s Repsol by 5%, to 9.8%, and has agreed to vote as a block with Spanish construction firm Sacyr Vallehermoso, a 20% owner. The pair will gain board seats and aim to split the chairman and chief executive officer roles now both held by Antonio Brufau. The Mexican state-owned oil monopoly says it has a shared vision with Sacyr for Repsol, including keeping the company independent and having representation in administrative bodies according to shareholder weight.
Posted inDaily Brief
Batista Sees IPOs Proceeding in 2012
Brazilian billionaire Eike Batista expects IPOs to go ahead for three of his companies next year, according to public remarks reported by wire and local news sources. Batista reaffirmed that the trio of listings – each either previously mentioned by Batista or expected to some degree by the markets – should take place next year when he expects market conditions to recover. An IPO for Colombian coal mining operation CCX should raise as much as $5bn. Batista plans to spin off the unit from electric generator MPX, and list shares in Bogota and Sao Paulo. EBX had indicated in March it planned the CCX sale, for a minimum of $1.5bn, and that it would eventually also list in London, a goal the group has for its other units. Less defined are the plans for the listing of gold miner AUX and real-estate company REX. The last Batista company to go public was OSX, raising $2.8bn in March 2010. The shipbuilder’s shares have never traded above a BRL800 offering price, closing at BRL320 Monday. With the Bovespa trading down more than 20% this year, new issuers have had a particularly hard time getting the valuations they seek.
Posted inDaily Brief
Chilean Port Plans Rights Offer
Chilean port operator Puerto de Lirquen plans to raise up to $100m through a rights offering to existing shareholders. The measure is to be approved on September 15. The operator of the port near Concepcion controlled by the Matte group does not indicate the use of proceeds. Its shares trade infrequently, and were indicated at CLP600 ($1.29) as of August 22.
Posted inDaily Brief
Camil Alimentos Pulls IPO Shelf
Brazilian food products specialist Camil Alimentos has cancelled its IPO shelf. The issuer, best known for its rice and beans, had registered with regulators in February, but never launched or indicated the size of the offering, which was to include primary shares, as well as secondary units sold by members of the controlling Quatiero family. Bradesco, Credit Suisse and Santander had been hired as managers.
Posted inDaily Brief
Peru, Colombia Nix Bolsa Merger
The Colombian and Peruvian stock exchanges have canceled plans to merge operations, indicating they need to focus first on improving the trading integration for Mercado Integrado Latinamericano (MILA). MILA, which began in May, created a cross-trading platform for the Chilean, Colombian and Peruvian bolsas, though it has been burdened initially with cross-border tax and regulatory problems. The project was launched amid much fanfare and expectations that it would create the second largest stock exchange in the region, behind Brazil’s Bovespa. But the Colombian and Peruvian exchanges postponed the merger in June after leftist candidate Ollanta Humala clinched the presidency and members of the incoming administration voiced doubts about such plans. The two say discussions could be picked up again in the future.
Posted inDaily Brief
Tenaris Moves to Delist Brazil’s Confab
Tenaris plans to delist Brazilian steel pipe maker Confab and make a public share purchase offer that could cost it up to BRL1.24bn ($775m). The Luxembourg-based steelmaker, which is controlled by Argentina’s Techint, is offering minority holders BRL5.20 per ordinary and preferred shares, which it says is a 35% premium to the 20-day average price. It represents a 7.0% premium to Monday’s BRL4.88 closing price. The offer would indicate a BRL1.24bn purchase if all holders accept. Tenaris owns 99% of Confab’s ordinary shares, representing 99% of voting rights and 41% of the share capital. It does not indicate when it expects to launch the offer, which still awaits regulatory approval. Tenaris has held a controlling stake in Confab, which operates under the TenarisConfab brand, since 1999.