Despite the urging of some investors, McDonald’s (MCD) will not spin off its real estate assets into a REIT. The much awaited decision was revealed by CEO Steve Easterbrook at the company’s investor meeting held earlier this week. The company spent a long time studying tax advantages and analyzing multiple benefits of the move and ultimately concluded that the… Read More »
Defense contractor Northrop Grumman (NOC) is feeling pretty good right now after having just won a massive contract for the new long range bomber. The company is also in the process of restructuring its organization by cutting its operating groups from 4 to 3, one of which will be called Technology Services. The move led to suspicion that… Read More »
It looks a bidding war has emerged for Starwood Hotels (HOT), with three Chinese players and Hyatt Hotels (H) all chasing the well respected hospitality brand. Kudos to those i-bankers for drumming up the interest, especially given the fact that the Chinese government rarely lets its corporate citizens get into bidding wars. While M&A is always exciting to… Read More »
A few small hits for a tough New York Thursday (at least for us Mets fans): Era Group (ERA), the helicopter focused spinoff from Seacor (CKH), got hit hard this week on news that Petrobras (PBR) was dropping its helicopter transport services. With falling oil prices and the company under intense scrutiny amidst a seemingly ever growing corruption scandal,… Read More »
After successfully tossing out the entire board of directors at Darden (DRI) last year, Jeffrey Smith’s Starboard Value fund quickly moved on executing its agenda. After all, a dominating win like that sort of gives one that kind of mandate. One of the first moves was eliminating the ‘interim’ tag from CEO Gene Lee. Next came the expected… Read More »
A few short hits to kick off a new week: Yum! Brands (YUM) decided to spin off its China business and shareholders have generally reacted pretty favorably. The WSJ walks through the potential value propositions of both companies, but one class of investors is decidedly less excited about the move: bondholders. Barron’s points out that the new parent… Read More »
About two months ago we noted that McDonald’s(MCD) was under pressure to spin off its real estate holdings into a REIT. According to a recent interview with board member Miles White, the company has been evaluating what to do with its real estate for some time and a decision will be made shortly, possibly as soon as November’s Investor… Read More »
If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again. Exterran Holdings (EXH) seems to have taken that motto to heart and is expected to finally complete the spinoff of its international services and global fabrications business on November 3rd. The company had been forced to delay its spinoff plans earlier this year due to a failed notes offering in… Read More »
The Federal Reserve formally approved Synchrony Financial’s (SYF) application to become a publicly traded savings & loan holding company. The approval is a key regulatory milestone for the company and its completion will pave the way for GE (GE) to finish separating the business via exchange offer. As its recent earnings report highlighted, GE has shifted its focus… Read More »
Sometimes there is just no stopping an idea full of momentum. After years of a spinoff idea being tossed around and pushed by all parts of Wall Street (sell side and buy side), Yum! Brands (YUM) has finally decided to pull the trigger and will spin off its China business into a standalone entity. While resistance appeared to… Read More »
That was fast. A few months after outlining an M&A focused growth strategy, Gannett (GCI) is actually ‘walking the walk’ with the announced $280m buyout of the Journal Media Group (JMG). The offer of $12 in cash per share represented a sizable premium of over 40% to the previous close. Readers of this site should be familiar with both… Read More »
A few short hits for the end of the week… The WSJ busted out an activist report card analyzing the results of ‘what happens to large U.S. companies after an activist arrives’. Naturally, the outcome is ‘mixed’. That said, it’s certainly an interesting data set to parse through and one is able to sort by activist or by… Read More »
A few links for a rain soaked Friday: Baxalta (BXLT) is getting a lot of attention in the press and this blog due to Shire’s(SHPG) hostile approach, but things haven’t been so quiet at parent Baxter International (BAX) either. Shortly after the spinoff, Dan Loeb’s Third Point unveiled a massive stake (close to 10%) in the healthcare product company. While… Read More »
While it was no Summer of Spin, the month of September witnessed plenty of activity on the spinoff front. In the days prior to month end: SPX Corporation (SPXC) spun off its flow products business into the aptly named SPX FLOW (FLOW) Fidelity National Financial Ventures (FNFV) unloaded part of its restaurant empire into J. Alexander Holdings (JAX) in a… Read More »
Yahoo’s (YHOO) planned Alibaba (BABA) stake spinoff was in serious limbo following notification from the IRS that it was declining to issue a private letter ruling blessing the planned transaction. The tricky part was that the government agency also didn’t say that it was objecting to the plan. Here is a good, easy to understand guide to the situation.… Read More »