If the filthy weather in parts of the UK yesterday conjured images of miserable holidays in caravan Parks, Electra Private Equity would rather it didn’t.
The UK investment trust (LON:ELTA) has not been deterred by the weather from merging its UK holiday Park businesses with those of Parkdean Holidays to create the UK’s largest holiday Park operator, with 73 sites.
The combined company will have an enterprise value – market value excluding cash or debt – of £960mln, with Electra owning 45% of the merged entity, while Alchemy Partners will own most of the rest.
A new £550mln debt facility will replace existing borrowings.
“The merger valuation of Electra's debt and equity interests in the Park Resorts Group implies an uplift of £21 million, equivalent to an increase in diluted NAV [net asset value] per share of 52p, compared to the 31 March 2015 valuation of £239 million and net investment since that date of £24 million,” a stock exchange announcement said.
Sticking with the wet and damp theme, Whirlpool, the US kitchen appliances firm, has been sniffing around to see how committed the board of up-market ovens firm Aga Rangemaster (LON:AGA) is to its impending nuptials with The Middleby Corporation.
Whirlpool wants to do its due diligence before making a firm offer, so in the meantime Aga continues to recommend acceptance of the Middleby offer, though it stressed that this does not preclude it from recommending an offer from Whirlpool at a later stage, should such an offer be forthcoming.
The third bit of merger news this morning is from bwin.party digital (LON:BPTY), the online gaming company that is being fought over by GVC Holdings (LON:GVC) and 888 Holdings (LON:888).
Appropriately enough, this is turning into a high stakes poker game, except we don’t actually know what 888’s latest bet is … it is a case of “I’ll see GVC’s bet of 124p a share (or thereabouts) and raise it by an amount that I will reveal later”.
I am not sure that sort of thing would wash in poker tournaments, but we will find out soon enough how much money is involved.
No bid news for Bacanora Minerals (LON:BCN, CVE:BCN), just some joint venture news regarding its partnership with Rare Earth Minerals (LON:REM).
Fans of both companies have been avidly reading this morning’s announcement that reveals a second drill rig has been mobilised at the Sonora project following the pair’s supply deal, announced last Friday, with lithium battery giant Tesla Motors (NASDAQ:TSLA).
The second rig has been mobilised to speed up drilling of the remaining nine holes of an 18-hold drilling programme, which is hoped to be completed this month.