Blackstone sweetens buyout offer for property developer St Modwen by £50m
Private equity firm Blackstone has offered to pay £50m more for property developer St Modwen, bringing its total takeover offer to £1.25bn.
The 560 pence per share cash offer for St Modwen is the final offer, the companies said today, adding that Blackstone could make another proposal if another suitor for St Modwen emerged.
Last month, Blackstone put forward a 542 pence per share takeover proposal, after the US-based company had made a series of preliminary offers to the real estate developer.
The latest offer is at a premium of about 25 per cent to St Modwen’s closing price the day before the first offer was made in May.
The deal is the latest real estate investment by Blackstone, which owns Sage Housing and earlier this year snapped up Butlins owner Bourne Leisure.
Overall the private equity giant has $196bn of assets under management dedicated to real estate.
Birmingham-based St Modwen, which was founded in 1966, has a portfolio worth £1.4bn across England and Wales.
The company builds homes, owns and manages several industrial and logistics assets in Britain.
A spokesperson for Aviva Investors, a major shareholder in St Modwen, said: “we are supportive of the board and we intend to vote in favour of the revised offer from Blackstone.”
Aberdeen Standard Investments investment director Romney Fox added: “We are supportive of the improved offer for St Modwen at 560p/share and intend to vote in favour.”