Italy’s Atlantia, a toll road operating company, has created a joint venture with Brazil’s energy and infrastructure company Bertin SA in an effort to pool motorway concession projects. The agreement creates the second largest motorway operator in Sao Paulo with a concession life of 25 years. Under the deal, each partner will control a 50% stake in a venture with assets that should generate Ebitda of roughly BRL630m ($359m) with net debt of BRL1.625bn ($926m) in 2012, Atlantia says. Morgan Stanley advised Atlantia on the deal. Officials from Atlantia and Bertin, however, could not immediately be reached for additional comment. A new company comprising holdings from both Atlantia and Bertin will issue equity at a price of BRL236 per share. Atlantia will contribute the Triangulo do Sol, 442 km motorway concession in Sao Paulo state, while Bertin will do the same with its Colinas and Nacentes das Gerais concessions in Sao Paulo and Minas Gerais. The deal also includes an option for the new company to acquire a 95% stake in SPMR, the holder of the Rodoanel motorway concession and the creation of a second joint venture company structured along similar lines with a 50/50 split to handle a 50% stake in the Tiete concession in Sao Paulo.
Category: M&A
Brazil’s Gafisa Wooed by Zell, GP
Brazilian homebuilder Gafisa is pondering a purchase proposal by billionaire real estate investor Sam Zell together with GP Investimentos. Gafisa officials admitted receiving a “preliminary asset purchase offer” and said they are analyzing the terms, but declined to offer additional details. The proposal would mean Zell’s repeat involvement with Gafisa after his investment company, Equity International, sold off its final 2.7% stake –
or 11.7m shares – in the real estate developer in August of 2011, worth about BRL84m ($54m) at the market price at the time. EI gradually reduced its stake in Gafisa starting in August 2010. Observers at the time attributed EI’s exit to Gafisa’s higher costs due to an investment in Brazilian builder Tenda, a player in the low-income segment of the housing market. Gafisa has 432.7m shares outstanding and a market capitalization of BRL2.32bn ($1.35bn). Its shares closed at BRL5.34 Thursday.
Mexico Blocks Televisa Deal with Iusacell
Mexican regulators have decided against approving multimedia company Televisa’s purchase of a 50% stake in wireless provider Iusacell, in a deal valued at $1.6bn. The companies reached an agreement in April 2011 as a way to give Televisa access to the mobile industry and strengthen Iusacell’s business. Commissioners at Mexico’s Comision Federal de Competencia, COFECO, voted 3 to 2 in favor of blocking the transaction, Televisa says. The company says it is contemplating “several legal alternatives” to encourage COFECO to reconsider its decision. Officials at Televisa declined to offer additional comments, while officials at Iusacell could not immediately be reached for more details. Televisa says it has invested $37.5m in Iuscacell equity, and another $1.565bn in Iusacell convertible debt paying 2% with a December 2015 conversion date. Iusacell, Mexico’s third largest cellular services company, has already begun using the invested funds. At the time of the transaction, Barclays estimated the deal came in at a pricey 21x EV/Ebitda multiple, using Iusacell’s 2009 Ebitda of $150m. The Televisa’s ADRs fell 3.3% on Thursday to $19.63 following the company’s confirmation of the regulatory move.
CSN Buys German Steelmaker
Brazil’s Companhia Siderurgica Nacional (CSN) has purchased all the shares of German long steel producer Stahlwerk Thuringen (SWT) and distributor Gallardo Sections from Spanish group Alfonso Gallardo for a EUR482.5m ($636.6m) price tag, assuming no indebtedness, the company says. CSN purchased the shares through its Spanish subsidiary CSN Steel which handles the company’s European operations. Officials at CSN did not respond to several inquiries for additional comment, while SWT officials could not immediately be reached for additional details. SWT has a 1.1m ton-per-year installed capacity, which would cement CSN’s steel division in the region. The SWT acquisition is the second announced this year by the Brazilian company. In early January, CSN announced the purchase of 14.7m shares in railroad operator MRS Logistica from the Belize-based International Investment Fund for an undisclosed sum.
Molymet Buys into US Rare Earth Producer
Chile’s Molibdenos y Metales (Molymet) has acquired a 13% stake in US rare earth producer Molycorp for $390.2m. The deal involves an all-cash acquisition of 12.5m shares of Molycorp common stock, for which Molymet gets a seat on Molycorp’s board. Officials at Molycorp could not immediately be reached for additional comment, and a Molymet spokesman declined to offer additional details of the transaction. Fitch Ratings noted that the deal should not affect Molymet’s BBB rating. Following the deal, Fitch estimates the Chilean company will maintain a debt to Ebitda ratio of 1.2x, a slight increase from its 1.0x four-year average, but still within its ratings range. Molymet is a leading player in the global market for molybdenum, a metal used to produce high-strength steel alloys, and rhenium, a rare silvery metal used in jet engine production. The deal gives Molymet the capacity to produce 19,050 metric tons of oxide from rare earths, and may reach 40,000 metric tons in 2013, the company says.
Canadian Pharma Gulps Brazilian Sports Drink Maker
Canadian pharmaceutical company Valeant has acquired Brazilian privately-held sports nutrition product and drink producer Probiotica Laboratorios in an all-cash deal valued at BRL150m ($86.7m). The acquisition cements Valeant’s foothold in Brazil, the one market, aside from Mexico, where Valeant maintains a presence in Latin America selling its generic pharmaceuticals. Valeant didn’t contract advisors for the deal, a spokeswoman says, and it is financing the buy with part of a new $500m tranche of its 2019 senior secured term loan B credit facility, announced earlier this week. Company officials estimate that the $86.7m that Valeant is paying for Probiotica represents an EV/Sales of 1.8x. Valeant previously acquired two Brazilian over-the-counter pharmaceutical companies in 2010 — one of which was Instituto Terapeutico Delta — a deal that included the purchase of a 165,000 square foot production plant.
Ecopetrol Buys 30% of Peruvian Block
Colombia’s Ecopetrol has agreed to acquire a 30% stake in an oil and gas exploration and production license in Peru from Spain’s Repsol. The deal involves participation in block 109 located in Peru’s Amazon jungle region, the companies say. Officials at Repsol and Ecopetrol declined to offer a total price tag for the deal but they said no advisors were involved in the transaction which was handled by the company’s own executive teams. Peru’s 109 block was originally assigned to Repsol by the Peruvian government in December 2005 and so far the venture, which involves an area of 357,200 hectares, is still in the exploratory stage. Ecopetrol already has a presence in the Andean country through participation in 4 blocks in partnership with Repsol and Argentina’s YPF.
Embonor Buys 50% of Plastics Maker
Coca-Cola Embonor, a bottler with operations in Bolivia and Chile, has purchased 50% of the outstanding shares of Envases CMF, a plastic container maker. Embonor paid CLP13.13bn ($26.3m) for the stake, which values the whole company at $56.2m, it says. The remaining 50% of the company is held by Embotelladora Andina, a Coca-Cola bottler that operates in Chile, Brazil and Argentina. Officials at Embonor declined to release details of the multiples paid for the company or how the transaction was financed. Officials at Envases could not immediately be reached for comment. The companies did not retain any advisors as they were comfortable in their knowledge of their respective businesses, an Embonor official says. Envases CMF manufactures plastic PET containers used for carbonated drinks, water, fruit drinks, and household cleaning products. The deal comes at a time of increasing consolidation in the carbonated drinks bottling business. This is particularly true in Mexico, a country that consumes more Coca-Cola than any other Latin American nation and is home to Coca-Cola Femsa (KOF), the largest bottler for Coca-Cola. In recent months KOF has acquired two regional independent bottlers in Mexico and industry observers expect more consolidation to take place going forward.
Mitsubishi Buys Brazilian Grain Stake
Mitsubishi has agreed to purchase a 20% stake in Grupo Los Grobo’s Ceagro do Brasil unit, one of Latin America’s top grain producers, for about JPY3.5bn ($45.61m).
Recently appointed Ceagro CFO Antonio Oliva Neto tells LatinFinance that the deal brings important synergies to the business. Ceagro focuses on financing producers, production, storage and supplying the local market, while Mitshubishi is active across the value chain from ports right down to the final consumer through supermarkets and fast food chains. “Ceagro will benefit from new business opportunities and be able to reach new markets,” he says. Mitsubishi is expected to purchase the stake through a capital increase. Ceagro currently operates in Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay and seeks to leverage the Mitsubishi deal to become a centralized grain originator in the countryside and also to export grain to new destinations. Ceagro officials declined to offer any additional details of the transactions. Officials at Mitsubishi could not immediately be reached for comment. Mitsubishi has been an active participant in the agricultural business in Latin America. Last year, the Japanese company had a hand in exporting more than 10m tons of grain from the USA, Brazil, Argentina and Australia to its customers in several Asian countries.
BP Buys 40% Stake in Petrobras Offshore Oil Block
BP has struck a farm-in deal with Brazil’s Petrobras that gives the UK oil major a minority stake in a deepwater block located in northern Brazil’s Ceara basin. As agreed, BP will take a 40% stake in the BM-CE-1 offshore block with 60% remaining in the hands of Petrobras, a BP spokesman says. Brazil’s energy regulator Agencia Nacional do Petroleo has approved the deal, the BP official adds. The BP spokesman declined to discuss additional details and Petrobras officials would not comment on the deal. Petrobras originally secured the license for the 1,281-square km-wide block in 2001 as part of Brazil’s third licensing round of oil exploration blocks. Entry into the Ceara basin is the latest BP offshore deal in the South American country since it bought the assets of Devon Energy in Brazil which included 10 exploration blocks, 7 of them in the Campos basin.