Singapore-listed real estate firm City Developments Ltd (CDL) is taking another stab at buying Millennium & Copthorne (M&C) Hotels in a deal that values the London-listed company at £2.2 billion (S$3.9 billion).
Channel News Asia reported that the offer represents a premium of about 37 per cent to M&C’s closing price of 500 pence last Thursday.
Currently, the company, part of Singapore’s Hong Leong Group, owns approximately 65.2 per cent of M&C. This offer is final and will not be increased, according to the Channel News Asia report.
CDL had in 2017 offered to take M&C private in a deal valued at £1.8 billion. The offer fell through last January as CDL did not satisfy the minimum acceptance condition of more than 50 per cent of M&C’s shares that it did not already own.
The move will return M&C – which operates the Millennium, Grand Millennium, Copthorne and Kingsgate hotels – to billionaire Kwek Leng Beng’s property empire.
In its current attempt, CDL said it has received “irrevocable undertakings” from key minority shareholders, who hold a combined 43.6 per cent of M&C shares not already held by CDL, to accept the final offer.
Quoting Sherman Kwek, CDL’s group CEO, CNL reported that the decision to take M&C private is in line with the company’s focus on boosting recurring income and enhancing underperforming assets.
