Barry Whyte

Lone Star, the Texas-based private equity firm, is discussing selling a 25 percent stake in Korea Exchange Bank to buyout fund MBK Partners after talks with rival bidder Australia and New Zealand Banking Group (ANZ), failed to date to produce a bid for a 57 percent stake. The 57 percent stake would be worth about $4.5 billion, but ANZ has not yet done its due diligence.

The Australian dollar has surged lately, which has increased the price of the proposed sale of the Foster’s wine business for the various private equity firms currently considering it, according to Reuters. The Australian dollar is now worth above 99 U.S. cents, which makes made the $3 billion wine business about 9 percent more expensive than when Cerberus, a buyout firm, approached them last month.

Harbin Electric’s chief executive, Tianfu Yang, and Baring Private Equity Asia Group, have made a bid worth $745.7 million for the Chinese electric motor manufacturer. Yang already owns around 31.1 percent of the shares and is offering $24 per share for the rest. It represents a 20 percent premium on Friday’s closing price.

A consortium consisting of Centerbridge Partners, Paulson & Co, and Blackstone Real Estate Partners VI has bought 100 percent of Extended Stay Inc, the Spartanburg, S.C., hotel group. Extended Stay has recently emerged from Chapter 11 protection. The deal was worth $3.925 billion.

Vikram Lall, CBE (Commander of the Order of the British Empire), has joined the board of Elephant Capital, the India-focussed private equity fund. Lall previously worked at Brewin Dolphin Holdings PLC, where he was corporate finance director and a board member for ten years. He was also corporate finance director at Bell Lawrie and White & Co. He was appointed CBE in 2005 for services to business in Scotland.

Private equity group Cidron has failed to get 50 percent of owners to back its buyout of the Swedish humidity control firm Munters. Cidron, which is owned by private equity fund Nordic Capital VII Ltd, is now considering its position. Cidron had been in a bidding war with Alfa Laval, which offered 75 crowns per share, 5.55 billion Swedish crowns ($828.1 million), which beat Cidron’s first bid of 73 crowns.

Energy Future Holdings Corp, which is backed by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co, expects to take a non-cash $4 billion goodwill impairment charge in the third quarter because of lower wholesale power prices, according to Reuters. KKR and Texas Pacific Group bought the company in 2007. In July, Standard & Poor's cut its rating on the company by four notches, saying that it sees a debt exchange as distressed and equivalent to a default.

Finnish investment firm CapMan intends to sell off OneMed, its medical supplies company. Potential buyers will be given information memorandums next week. Nordic buyout firms such as IK Investment Partners, Nordic Capital and EQT are likely to be interested by the sale. CapMan owns a 65.9 percent stake in OneMed.

France could drop its objections to a law which would control hedge funds operating in the EU, in exchange for concessions from London, according to Reuters. The proposed law has upset US hedge funds and private equity firms because it would restrict how they operate within the EU.

Entertainment website Hulu’s planned IPO could raise between $200 million and $300 according to Reuters. The IPO plan could be filed with the SEC this year and take place in the first half of 2011. The deal would value the company at about $2 billion. The online video service is backed by General Electric Co's NBC Universal, Walt Disney Co, News Corp and private equity firm Providence Equity Partners.