The weekend that just concluded was an extraordinary one for the Milan stock exchange. In fact, with the closing of the price lists came two important announcements: in chronological order, the first concerns Tod, followed by Saras’ turn in two different ways with the heroes of the Della Valle and Moratti families. Let’s go in order.
512 million purchase offer for Della Valle and Tod’s
Global fashion giant LVMH, famous for its Louis Vuitton brand, decided to support the Della Valle family in the reorganization of the shoe group with a public takeover offer (takeover offer) for all shares of Tod’s traded on Piazza Affari. Acting materially will be the L Catterton fund, an American private equity fund controlled by the French group, which has decided to offer 43 euros for each share of the Marche company. This is almost 18% more than the last stock market price recorded on Friday, February 9th. It is a price far from the price of over 60 euros, which represents the maximum level reached by the stock in the last year and a half, but was reached in mid-2021. The expected investment to purchase all shares within the scope of the takeover offer is 512 euros. million euros.
However, the Italian family led by Diego Della Valle will not lose control of the company it founded. In fact, the mechanism foresees that at the end of the operation, Della Valles will retain 54% of the shares, with 36% going to the special purpose vehicle Crown Bidco (L Catterton) and 10% to the company Delphine. The second is a direct statement from LVMH’s Bernald Arnault, who entered the capital of the Marche company several years ago and later supported Chiara Ferragni’s entry into the board of directors. Della Valles will retain the majority because they will only give the bidder 10.45% of the shares they own, which currently equals more than 64% of the capital.
Della Valles is trying to delist Tod’s for the second time with a takeover bid backed by LVMH. 40 euros per share was offered in 2022, but the market did not like it and the operation was later withdrawn. 43 euros are now on offer, and news on the actual market value of this figure is awaited, especially after the company presented encouraging results for the 2023 financial year, which it closed with revenues of over 1.1 billion euros.
650 million from the sale of Morattis to Vitol (but government may intervene)
Shortly after Tod’s announcement came Moratti and Saras’ announcement. The official confirmation came after rumors had been circulating for several days that Swiss-Dutch oil trading giant Vitol was interested in the Italian company. The Moratti family announced that it is completely withdrawing from the oil refining industry, agreeing to sell 35% of the shares shared between Massimo Moratti, who owns 40% of the company in total, and Angelo and Gabriele Moratti, heirs of the late Gian Marco. The missing 5% has actually been sold through an operation currently carried out by Angelo Moratti and can be acquired by Vitol itself by purchasing derivative products.
According to the report, it was the two sons of the former president of Saras who requested the sale, who had nothing to do with managing such a complex enterprise, which was built 62 years ago in Sarroch near Cagliari and has been the main concern for decades. The reference point in the Mediterranean basin for oil refining. The ball will now pass to the government, which will decide whether to activate the golden power, taking into account the specific activities of the company.
In any case, Moratti will sell 35% of his shares at 1.75 euros per share; This price is lower than the last exchange value recorded on Friday, February 9th and is equal to 1.79 euros. However, due to rumors talking about an offer of 2.2 euros per share, this amount also approached 2 euros. Morattis is expected to collect approximately 650 million euros from the sale price. After the sale of the shares, a takeover bid will be launched at 1.75 euros per share, aimed at delisting the company, in which case the market will make the final decision on the validity of the offer, apparently disappointing so much so that the securities fall at the beginning of trading.
Actually, not much is known about Vitol. Founded in 1966 in Rotterdam (but headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland), today it is a premier energy products trader with approximately 40 offices worldwide. Among other things, it has 17 million cubic meters of storage capacity worldwide, a refining capacity of approximately 500 thousand barrels per day, more than 7,000 service stations and a growing portfolio of transit and renewable energy facilities. Revenue in 2022 was $505 billion. With the completion of the Saras transaction, Vitol will have a refining capacity of over 800 thousand barrels per day, 4 gigawatts of thermal energy production and over 1.4 gigawatts of renewable energy production.
“After 62 years since it was founded by my father, together with my nephews Angelo and Gabriele and my sons Angelomario and Giovanni, I thought that the best guarantee of the future success of the Sarroch refinery was a merger with one of the main industrial operators in the global energy sector. Chairman and CEO of Saras Massimo Moratti said in a note: Industry like Vitol is equipped with the necessary relational, financial and managerial resources to compete in the current international market context.
Source: Today IT
Roy Brown is a renowned economist and author at The Nation View. He has a deep understanding of the global economy and its intricacies. He writes about a wide range of economic topics, including monetary policy, fiscal policy, international trade, and labor markets.
