(Reuters) – Indian conglomerate Sahara India Pariwar is in discussions about buying the debt of struggling film studio Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer for $1.5 billion to $2 billion, according to two people familiar with the matter. The sources did not elaborate on Sahara India Pariwar’s plans for MGM, which has about $4 billion in debt, and stressed that […]
Clorox Co. is near a deal to sell its STP and Armor All auto-care brands to Avista Capital Partners, according to Bloomberg News. The deal is valued at $750 million to $800 million, the story said. Blackstone Group LP, Golden Gate Capital and Castle Harlan Inc. were among firms that looked at the assets, which have been on the block since April. J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. is advising on the process.
(Reuters) - Private equity firms Kohlberg Kravis Roberts and TPG have held early talks about teaming up to bid for the wine unit of Australian brewer Foster's, the Australian Financial Review said on Monday. The pair are yet to decide whether to proceed either together or separately, the newspaper said in its online Dealbook. In 2007, KKR and TPG TPG.UL united to take Texas-based Energy Future Holdings, formerly TXU, private in the largest leveraged buy out ever.
Tom Hicks, Liverpool's co-owner, has inked a financing deal with a PE firm to retain ownership of the club, according to the Associated Press Hicks, along with co-owner George Gillett Jr., had put Liverpool up for sale in April, saying they lacked the funding to take club forward due to its debt of 237 million pounds ($370 million), the story said. GSO Capital Partners, which is owned by the Blackstone Group, has offered Hicks a two-year funding package worth around 280 million ($437 million) pounds ahead of the October deadline facing the owners to repay the club's debt to Royal Bank of Scotland. Blackstone, in return for its investment, would share control of the club.
General Atlantic has put AKQA, a digital agency, on the block, according to Ad Age. Morgan Stanley is advising on the auction, the report said. Potential buyers could include publishers to ad holding companies. According to the report, which cited Stuart Smith, a U.K. blogger, Dentsu has made a $600 million bid for AKQA.
(Reuters) - Egan-Jones Proxy Services has recommended that Barnes & Noble Inc. shareholders support the bookseller in its proxy battle with billionaire investor Ron Burkle, becoming the second advisory firm this week to side with the bookstore chain. Egan-Jones said shareholders should support two of Barnes & Noble's three nominees for the board, including chairman and top shareholder Leonard Riggio at the retailer's annual meeting on Sept. 28 in New York. It also urged them to reject Burkle's proposal to change Barnes & Noble's anti-takeover poison pill.
(Reuters) - Buyout firm Silver Lake agreed on Sunday to buy a minority stake in Brazilian Web hosting company Locaweb for an undisclosed sum, to tap explosive growth in the world's fifth-largest Internet market. Locaweb currently hosts one in every four sites with the ".com.br" domain root. Silver Lake's Silver Lake Sumeru, the private equity fund's unit that invests in mid-sized technology companies, made the purchase of the undisclosed stake in Sao Paulo-based Locaweb, the company said. Sumeru has about $14 billion of investors' money in Nasdaq OMX, Avaya, Skype and other technology companies.
(Reuters) - KKR & Co., TPG Capital, Carlyle Group and Bain Capital Llc are competing to acquire a part of Honda Motor Co's stake in India's biggest motorcycle maker, Hero Honda Motors, Bloomberg reported. Two of the funds may jointly buy about 15 percent, valued at $1.1 billion in Hero Honda, the news agency said, citing three anonymous sources. Another 5 percent may be sold to the Munjal family, founders of the Hero group, the report said, citing two unidentified people. Honda Motor and the Hero Group each own 26 percent in Hero Honda.
Aspen Dental, which is being acquired by Leonard Green, received a “B” corporate credit rating with a stable outlook from Standard & Poor’s. S&P, in a statement Thursday, said the stable rating reflects expectations that Aspen will continue growing but that leverage will remain high. It’s unclear how much debt Aspen actually has. However, Aspen Dental is in the market trying to raise about $230 million in fresh credit. This includes a $195 million term loan and a $35 million 5-year revolving credit facility, according to Thomson Reuters Loan Pricing Corp. UBS is leading the loan package, LPC said.
An investor group led by Gores Group LLC of Los Angeles acquired the Cosmopolis high purity cellulose mill from Weyerhaeuser Co. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed. The group includes Dermot Smurfit, a paper and packaging industry veteran.