Mexican Targets European Food Purchase

Mexico’s Sigma Alimentos is making a EUR675m ($908m) bid for European meat company Campofrio Food Group, it says. The food products unit of Grupo Alfa has signed purchase agreements with shareholders for shares representing 45.2% of the company, at EUR6.80 per share, and will launch a cash tender offer to buy the remaining shares, it says. Campofrio shares closed at EUR6.87 Thursday. The agreements bring Pedro Ballve, a Campofrio family member, into Sigma as a shareholder and chairman of the board. Sigma will finance the buy with credit it has lined up already. The banks and law firms advising on the transaction have not been disclosed. Separately, Sigma is targeting an IPO via Citi, Goldman Sachs, Bank of America Merrill Lynch and Banorte-Ixe, for which the timing is unclear.