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 »
It’s been a rough road for Yahoo(YHOO)’s planned spinoff of its Alibaba(BABA) stake into Aabaco Holdings. After months of sniping with the IRS, culminating with the agency’s refusal to issue a private letter ruling, the company decided to move ahead anyway without the ruling and rely instead on the opinion of counsel. The company backed a Q4 date… Read More »
Amidst a brutal environment for IPOs, Fiat Chrysler’s(FCAU) IPO of 10% of Ferrari(RACE) seems to have bucked the trend. The IPO priced at $52, at the top of the $48 to $52 range, in the face of strong demand. At this price, Ferrari will have a market capitalization of nearly $10 billion. With a small float of just… 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 »
Bill Ackman loved its business model of purchasing companies with “mispriced” drugs and raising prices, but, under fire from regulators and legislators, Valeant(VRX) announced today that it will be completely changing its business model. Recent outrage about huge price increases for acquired drugs including public statements by Democratic Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton have been a cause of the… Read More »
Chip Rewey is the manager of Third Avenue’s Value(TVFVX) and Small Cap Value(TVSVX) funds, having recently succeeded value investing legend Marty Whitman. Rewey was interviewed by Barrons.com yesterday, and shared his excitement about SPX Flow(FLOW), which was very recently spun off from SPX Corp(SPXC). Q:Have fears over oil and gas led you to other opportunities lately? A: SPX… Read More »
Posters featuring its iconic speedsters grace the walls of teenagers’ bedrooms around the world. Now, fans will have a chance to own a piece of the company. Management is busy on the road this week promoting an IPO of Ferrari. The company, 90% of which is owned by Fiat Chrysler(FCAU), will, naturally, trade under the ticker RACE. The IPO… 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 »
For years, a favorite speculation of the spinoff prognosticators has been that Amazon(AMZN) should spin off its fast growing Web Services business. These rumors have had little basis in reality. After all, Jeff Bezos does what he wants, and pays little heed to the whims of others. The buzz only intensified when Amazon recently began breaking out the… 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 »